


OtherWhen, Part IV

by flamethrower



Series: Re-Entry [12]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, F/M, GFY, M/M, Psychological Torture, Sith
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-03-12
Updated: 2009-03-12
Packaged: 2017-10-23 12:44:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 53,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/250439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flamethrower/pseuds/flamethrower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The block has fallen, and Darkness lies beyond it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	OtherWhen, Part IV

I threw myself into building the Alliance, packing away my Jedi tunics in favor of clothing that was common throughout the new Empire. I helped the tiny movement set up bases in remote regions of the galaxy. I secured supplies, ran freight past Imperial blockades, and slept only enough to keep myself alive.

Occasionally I would run into survivors of the Purges. We knew each other for what we were, but never spoke the word. I sent them on their way with a greeting and a hint of safer territories. A few of the younger ones put aside their lightsabers and joined the Alliance. I didn't know if they would survive, but I couldn't blame them for wanting to fight back.

By rumor and eyewitness accounts, I was able to pinpoint the existence of fifty remaining Jedi. There were no survivors of the Council besides Yoda and myself to be found. Not once did I encounter anyone who had been my friend.

I trained a fighting wing that was stationed on an abandoned mining platform near Bespin. I wasn’t surprised to find that my pilots were soldiers from the war, regular men and women who had fought alongside the clone troopers. I knew I wasn’t going to be there when the wing actually saw service, so I taught Tyree and Dutch how to lead a squad, and then made sure that they could teach that knowledge to others. The two young men were eager to learn, and had picked up a lot of flight tactics when they had served under Anakin’s command.

With no one shooting at me, I even managed to remember that I had liked piloting. The X-Wing fighter wasn’t as powerful as the Jedi fighter I was used to, but damned if they weren’t fun to fly. I spent a few months working with the pilots, hauling Tyree and Dutch with me to different stations, not satisfied until they and everyone we taught could fly rings around me.

“Sure wish Anakin was here with us,” Dutch said one day, cooling down after a flight. I glanced at him and looked away, remaining silent. They knew that Anakin was dead, and nothing beyond that. I could have explained to him exactly why Anakin would never have joined us, but I didn’t. It seemed kinder that the galaxy remember Anakin as he had been - not what he was like at his death. Anakin Skywalker, hero of the Republic, Jedi Knight, was a far better epitaph than Darth Vader, scourge of the Jedi, murderer of children.

Before moving on again, I spoke to Yoda, who was keeping the equipment on his ship running well despite the encroaching swamp. “Dagobah, interesting it is,” the Master said, and I could see that the year since our parting had not been easy for him. He blew a gusty sigh, and the snake that was draped around his neck flicked its tail in annoyance at having been startled. “A Bpfasshi rogue, here he had been hiding.”

“One of the dark ones?” I asked, appalled. I thought we had destroyed all of the traitorous bastards. Six Jedi falling to darkness at once had been bad enough. The fact that they had turned on us after my unit had saved their lives was another issue entirely. I lost half of those following me that day, and if it weren’t for Yoda, Mace, and Adi Gallia’s arrival, I might have died, too. I half-smiled, thinking that with the way things had turned out, death would have been a kindness.

“Mmm. Content to let him be, I was, but challenged me he did.” Yoda petted the snake absently. “Told Joran, I did, that his temper would be his downfall. Listen to me, he never would.”

“I’m glad you’re all right, Master,” I said, relieved that Yoda had been the victor of that battle. “Master, the reason that I called…” I hesitated. They were just rumors, but they made my skin crawl, regardless. “There is a rumor of another Sith.”

Yoda’s ears rose. “A new Sith, you say? A name do you have, Obi-Wan?”

I shook my head, frustrated. “No name. If his name has been given to anyone, they haven’t lived long enough to share it. It is said, though, that he has been tasked with hunting down every Jedi who survived the Purges.”

Yoda glanced away from the vid feed, his eyes troubled. “Terrible news, this is. So few of us, there are. Leave us be, I wish they would.”

“So do I,” I said. I was so tired of running. “I feel as if I am being followed, everywhere I go.”

“Careful, you will be?” Yoda looked back at me in concern. “Worry for you, I do. Worried about you, Qui-Gon also is.”

I smiled. Yoda kept teasing me with the fact that he and my Master spoke often. “One day, I promise, he will be able to berate me himself. When it is safe to go back to Tatooine…” I trailed off. I didn’t know if it was ever going to be safe to go back. The threads of possibility that dealt with my own fate had always been something of a mystery to me. 

Suddenly my vision seemed a little too bright. “Tell him that I miss him,” I told Yoda softly.

Yoda smiled at me. “Knows that, he does. Something original to say, you should think of.”

I grinned back, challenged. “I could ask you to tell him that the little green troll is a big tease, but I think he knows that, as well.”

Yoda looked miffed. “Hmph. When nine hundred years old you reach, more respect for your elders you will have.”

That damned urge to cry was back. “I love you, Master Yoda.”

Yoda stared back, and I could feel the love he had for me, and had to resist the urge to press my cheek into the Force touch he projected from half a galaxy away. “Love you I do, Obi-Wan. May the Force be with you.”

I shut down that connection, only to find I had a file waiting for me. Bail had slipped in another message while I was talking to Yoda. I opened it and skimmed the text after running the garbled data through a decoder program. There was news of what different branches of the Alliance were up to, along with mention of the growing number of cells. That one was more rumor than concrete, since we didn't want to keep a running tally, but it felt right. Garm bel Iblis was creating a stir in the Senate by demanding that the Empire recognize the authority of the Corporate Sector Authority to patrol Corellian space. I raised an eyebrow at that, hoping bel Iblis was watching his back.

The last of the message was an image file, and I brought it up on the screen. A picture of a child, a toddler, with short, curly wisps of light brown hair and dark brown eyes. Her mother's eyes. “Leia,” I whispered, smiling, and touched the image. There was fire in those lively brown eyes. “Padmé, your little girl is going to devastate someone's heart one day,” I said, and had to blink back sudden tears. I wondered if Luke's eyes had changed as he'd grown, or if he still had the pale blue eyes of his father. I almost hoped they'd changed, as infant eyes in humans tended to do. I didn't know if I'd ever be able to look at him without seeing the ghost of Anakin Skywalker.

 

 

*          *          *          *

 

It was six months to the day since I had last spoken with Yoda. I was standing in the rain on Kamino, cursing at a shipping registry. I managed not to curse the pilot who had foolishly labeled his cargo for what it was. “It’s hard to have secret cargo when everyone knows what the hell it is!” I yelled, aware I was losing my temper and not much caring. The weapons were needed by the Alliance, but the supplies weren’t worth exposing one of the resistance cells. Which was what Avery, the ship’s owner, was damned close to doing.

I was tired, I was hungry, and I was soaking wet and cold. Cold and wet had always been my least favorite combination. Rain was pouring down hard enough to bounce off of our heads. “How was I supposed to know it was for the blasted Alliance?” Avery yelled back, and I winced. He wasn’t part of the Alliance, but he knew of it, and had about as much sense as a Nerf after a stun blast.

I was contemplating using the Force on him to make him forget the entire mess when a blaster shot I hadn’t even sensed coming went through his eye. He slumped forward into my arms, dead before he’d even begun to fall.

I shoved his body aside, pulling my lightsaber from its hidden place at my back as I scanned the landing platform.

I stepped aside, neatly avoiding another blaster shot. The end of a blaster rifle appeared behind a pile of shipping crates, and then the owner of the blaster rifle emerged.

“Asajj,” I whispered, igniting my lightsaber. Dooku’s protégé bowed her head in mocking greeting. “It’s a pleasure to see you again.” The last time Anakin and I had confronted her, she had disappeared. At that point, I'd honestly thought we'd seen the last of her.

“Liar,” she said, giving me a feral grin. “Unless you liked the things I did to you. I wouldn’t put it past a Jedi to have a masochistic streak.”

No, I did not have a masochistic streak. I had never appreciated being tortured, and she had been more skillful at it than bore remembering. “What do you want?” I asked, hoping it wasn’t a fight. I wasn’t in the best shape at the moment, and Asajj Ventress had nearly killed me once already.

She tossed the blaster rifle aside. Rain was running in rivulets down her pale face, but she seemed oblivious to the cold. “I have been paid to make sure that you’re dead. I would have done it for free, to be honest. I hate you, and everything your kind used to stand for.” She smiled in pleasure. “It’s so nice to be able to think of the Jedi Order in the past tense.”

At least I knew, now, who had been following me all this time. She ignited her lightsabers, and I shook water from my face and met her blades. A single blue blade crossed two lines of red, and then we spun apart before the dance began in earnest.

She was fast, mercilessly so, and more than once I felt a blade score my arm or my leg as we fought. I didn’t flinch away – I stayed in her face, giving as good as she gave. The Force sang with me, leading my steps, guiding my hand. A parry and a strike, and I severed the hilt of one of her lightsabers in half. She tossed it aside with a shriek as molten metal dripped onto her hand.

I blinked water from my eyes as she screamed curses at me, and wondered when I’d become good enough with a blade to match Ventress with this kind of ease. Before, defeating her usually meant driving myself to exhaustion. “Getting old?” I asked, not even panting for breath.

Ventress glared at me with baleful eyes, holding her side, and I realized that I had marked her with my lightsaber at some point. “ _You_ will get no older,” she hissed, and leapt back into the fight.

I spun, countering her spinning strike, recognizing the tactic for one of Dooku’s. I offered her a feral grin and stabbed at her with my blade, grin widening as I struck home and her arm fell to her side, useless. She howled in agony, and charged in, swinging her remaining blade in a wide arc. I was shocked by her loss of control, but it didn’t keep me from acting.

I ducked beneath her lightsaber and shoved my blade into her chest. She wheezed out a single breath, saying a word that might have been my name, and with the last of her strength slammed the length of her remaining lightsaber blade against my back.

The pain was immediate, and I screamed as I fell to the platform. Asajj’s body collapsed on top of me. My back was a line of fire, and for a moment I only lay there under her dead weight, too stunned to move.

Finally I took a tentative breath, hissing. It hurt, but I was going to live. _At least for now_ , I thought, struggling to get out from underneath Ventress.

I gasped out another breath and shoved her away, rolling onto my side. I had been wounded by lightsabers so many times that I should have been used to it. I panted for air, trying not to breathe so deeply, for that hurt enough to make me want to retch.

I glanced at Asajj Ventress, and saw dead, staring eyes. I looked down at the cauterized wound of her chest and my stomach heaved. I managed not to vomit, but blacked out instead.

 

*          *          *          *

 

I came to when I snorted water into my nose. I hadn’t been lying on the platform that long, but now I was soaked to the skin. I tried to move and whimpered, too stunned to scream, at the raw pain in my back. My arms and legs were marred by little hurts, but the burn on my back made them inconsequential.

I needed to get moving. No one was going to come looking for me. There would be no last minute rescue. I was going to have to save my own ass.

I laughed at myself, knowing I must have presented one very pathetic sight. I couldn’t even stand. I settled for crawling to the nearest ship, which had belonged to Gus Avery until Ventress had killed him. I spared a moment to offer him a silent apology for leaving him where he had fallen. The Alliance was going to have to do without this batch of supplies, because I was in no shape to load them. My own ship, Grievous's pilfered space fighter, could stay where it was parked. Suddenly I never wanted to see it again. Someone else could have the damned thing.

The boarding ramp was the hardest part – the incline was tough to manage, and I had to pause halfway up the ramp. My breath was coming in short gasps, and my hands were being scraped raw. No matter. I resumed my scrambling climb, making it into the floor of the cargo bay. I lay there, feeling the cold of the deck tiles soak into my face, and knew I had to keep moving.

If I was lucky, the burn wouldn’t get infected, and I could die of pneumonia instead. The thought made me laugh again, but the laugh was cut off when I uttered a sharp gasp when the action rent burnt flesh. Laughing was definitely a bad idea.

I shed my coat in the cargo bay, and managed enough concentration to hit the hatch seals with the Force. The ramp began to rise, and I moved my leg out of the way so my foot wouldn’t get caught in the mechanism. I took a deep breath and pulled myself upright, moaning and shutting my eyes tight against the pain the movement caused me. Once I was on my feet, though, I could walk. I made my way to the cockpit, hunched over like an old man working on his twelfth decade.

Sitting felt like too much effort, though I had never piloted a ship through atmosphere while standing. I couldn’t just wait here for someone to retrieve me, either. Kamino had been abandoned since early in the war, but if Asajj Ventress had found me here, so could anyone else.

I plotted in an automatic course for the ship to follow until it was in orbit around the planet and braced myself as the ship took off. I hoped the computer would be able to handle the ascent, because I didn’t want to have to fight the controls if something went wrong.

Maybe the Force was still with me, because the ship made it into space without incident. I breathed a quiet sigh of relief and then activated the emergency beacon, keyed on a signal that only the Alliance and crazy radio-signal hermits paid attention to.

Imagine my surprise, two days later, when my beacon was answered by none other than the _Tantive IV_.

It was an even greater surprise when Bail met me at the ramp of Avery’s ship. I took two more steps and practically fell into Bail’s arms. “Hi,” I said, fighting a very un-Jedi-like urge to giggle. I’d probably taken one too many of the pain-killers that Avery had stashed in his med-kit.

“Gods,” Bail muttered, shaking his head. “I knew if it was you setting off the emergency beacon that it had to be bad. I left Leia with Breha and got here as soon as I could. What happened?”

“Ventress,” I said. Then Bail’s hands brushed my back, and all of the pain killers in the world weren’t enough. I screamed as raw nerves lit up like an ion blast, the edges of my vision graying out.

 

*          *          *          *

           

Terza, Garen, Siri, Kit Fisto, Bant, Ki-Adi Mundi, Eeth, Anakin, Padmé, Liam, Father… I awoke to the litany of names in my head and tears running from the corners of my eyes, soaking my hair. The small medical bay of the _Tantive IV_ was silent. I glanced around; the droids had all been powered down for night cycle, though a light was still on in the medical officer’s room.

I sat up in the bed, wincing as healing skin pulled in strange and uncomfortable ways. I stank of bacta, though I barely remembered being prepped for the tank. I pulled up the sleeve of the loose shirt I was dressed in, and found no scars from the lightsaber burns there, nor were there any scars on my legs. My back was probably just as undamaged.

I loved bacta. I wished it had been around when I was a Padawan, because it would have saved me a lot of scars and recovery time. I sighed, thinking that many more lives could have been saved then, too.

I rose and collected my things, left in a neat pile on a table by the bed. I took a moment to smile - Bail had replaced everything that had been burned or damaged. I dressed in the dark, not willing to gain the attention of whoever was still awake in that office, and made my escape from the medical bay.

I walked through the ship’s silent hallways, passing no one. With the ship in hyperspace, only the bridge crew kept a watch during the traditional night cycle. There was an observation lounge in the middle of the ship, and I dropped my things by the door, walking over to stand by the window.

The stars streaked by in a blue-white blur. I stood there and could not stop remembering.

Mace had been killed by Sidious and Vader, along with Kit Fisto, Saesee Tiin, and Agen Kolar. Palpatine said it was part of a Jedi Rebellion, but the rest of us in the Alliance knew better, and not even the best Imperial propaganda was going to change our minds. How Mace and the others had discovered Palpatine's true identity, I still didn't know, but I was glad they'd tried their best to stop him.

Shaak Ti had been cut down on the security tapes of the Temple, but I knew she'd survived that because she had become a victim of Palpatine's mysterious new apprentice. Kimal, though, had been murdered during the raid in the Temple. I'd found him myself, lying next to the Padawan that he'd died trying to protect. Jocasta had been with them, her hand still gripping the lightsaber that most didn't even know she still carried. Plo Koon, Aayla, Barriss, Luminara, Stass Allie, Coleman, and thousands of others, so many names I couldn't count them all, had fallen prey to Order 66. The war had crippled our numbers, but Palpatine had destroyed us.

I let my head fall forward to rest against the cool transparisteel, and realized what had awoken me. Somewhere out in the galaxy, my father's heart had failed him at last. I had known the day was coming, but that did not make it hurt less. One moment together in sixteen years. It wasn't enough.

Other Jedi were out there, trying to hide from the Emperor’s decree. I would sometimes wake up with the knowledge that somewhere, another had just been slain. The Empire was making sure that every remaining Jedi was criminalized, jailed, enslaved, or forgotten. No name would be memorialized. No pyre would consume their bodies.

It was never going to end. Not unless someone did something about it.

I stared at my reflection and wondered at the burning anger I could see in my eyes.

           

*          *          *          *

 

“Obi-Wan, you shouldn't do this. You've barely healed from your injuries as it is!” Bail stepped back as I pushed past him, shoving my blaster into its holster and clipping my lightsaber to my belt. I'd even dug my tunics out of storage. To wear them again after a year's time was like sliding back into a familiar skin.

“I have to do _something_ , Bail!” I bit out, my hands shaking as I picked up the set of throwing knives that one of our friends had gifted me. The Captain had meant it as a skill to learn in enjoyment, something to take my mind off of the escalating conflict of the war. I had practiced, using the excuse of honing my skills with the small blades as a way to avoid thinking when engagements ended and casualties were reported. “I can't just let Palpatine destroy everything we hold dear.”

“He'll kill you,” Bail said flatly, arms crossed. He watched as I tucked each knife away, unseen until needed. “Even if you manage to get past the stormtroopers and the Imperial Guard, Palpatine will destroy you. Even Master Yoda stood no chance against him!”

I turned back to him, jaw set grimly. “I know that. I know who he is, what he is, what he can do. I know he spent years manipulating us for his own ends. He spent years manipulating my Padawan--” My voice broke, and I looked away. When I could look at Bail again, my eyes burned, but no tears fell. “I owe Anakin this.”

“Anakin made his choice,” Bail said, his voice soft. “For good or ill, it was his choice. He is dead, and there is nothing you can do about it.”

I smiled, and even to me the expression felt cold. “Yes, there is.”

Bail gripped my arm, trying one last time to stop me. “Obi-Wan, do not throw your life away. Yoda and I can only do so much to hide your people. There are too few Jedi left as it is. I mean - gods! Are you _trying_ to kill yourself?”

Bail's words stopped me, and I sank down on the small bunk in the tiny guest quarters I'd been given. “I don't know,” I admitted. Everything that Bail was saying was true, and I knew it. Part of me looked upon that knowledge and nodded - the rest of me, some cold part that had formed as the war progressed, did not care. I looked up and met his eyes, my voice calmer than it was before. “I need to do this, Bail. If I do not, if I do not at least try, I will not be able to forgive myself. I can't even sleep without remembering...” I trailed off. The feel of all of those deaths broke my sleep, haunted my dreams. Yet when I was awake it was worse. I clenched my jaw. For Anakin, for the Jedi, I would at least try to make things right.

I looked up at Bail and saw him sigh, and knew that he wouldn't try to change my mind again. But what he said next shocked me. “Then I will accompany you,” he said, resolute.

The horror I felt in that moment was audible in my voice. “No!” I yelled. “No, don't you even think it! The Alliance needs you, your daughter needs you! The galaxy can do without me, but not you! Don't you dare follow me!”

“Is that the General's orders?” Bail said, giving me a despairing smile. Oh yes. He knew that I wasn’t coming back. Maybe he understood it even more than I did.

“No,” I replied, smiling back. “That is the request of your friend.” I laughed sharply. “A broken Jedi, but maybe there's enough light left within me to see this through.”

Bail stepped forward and sat down on the bunk next to me. “Then I will say only two more things. Try to come back, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You promise me that you will try your damnedest to come back to me - to all of us.”

I nodded slowly. I could do that, at least. “I promise to try to do as you ask, my friend. If all goes well, then I will see you on Alderaan in one month's time.”

“And if it doesn't?” Bail asked, sadness and heartbreak in his eyes as he looked at me. I shrugged. What else could I say to that?

“What's the second thing?” I asked, taking his hand in mine, realizing only when I touched warm skin that my hand was ice cold.

Bail smiled, gripping the hand that I'd offered him. “Stay with me tonight, General. One more time, before you go off and try to save the galaxy like a damned fool.”

My resolve wavered, and for one moment I wondered at the insanity of what I was about to do. Then I thought about the Temple's security vids and that hesitation melted away. I nodded my agreement, and followed Bail from my tiny quarters to join him in his.

 

*          *          *          *

 

Sneaking onto Coruscant was easy with Dex arranging matters. The big Besalisk was helping to run a group called the Erased, shuttling those who wished to hide from the Empire to new locations. It was good to see him putting his old skills as a slicer to use. Thanks to him, it was a relatively simple matter to get myself smuggled onto the planet in a load of cargo bound for the Industrial zone.

There were apartments in the highest levels of Coruscant that the public knew to be the home of the former Chancellor-turned-Emperor. They had been the established home of every Chancellor for the last hundred years - and they were only for show. For reasons of security, the actual Chancellor's residence was in a building much further from the Senate dome.

I didn't bother with that, either, because I knew that Palpatine wouldn't be there. Instead I let the Force guide my steps, using it to track a strong feeling of despair and darkness that came from deep inside the Industrial zone. Sidious's residence wasn't hard to find, and that bothered me. Even the most powerful Jedi among us had not sensed this dank pit, and I knew the moment I saw it, hidden far from prying eyes, that it had been here for a long time.

Then again, we hadn't sensed Palpatine's true identity, either. Somehow he had hidden the entirety of his dark power from us. Maybe I'd get the chance to ask him how he'd done it, if it didn't interfere with me killing him. There would be political repercussions from such an act, but I couldn't see that it would make the state of the galaxy any worse. Blame the Jedi? Fine. We were already being exterminated. What were they going to do, destroy us twice?

I walked towards the only entrance I could see, cautious. There were no visible guards, no security cameras or other means of defense. I was holding my unlit lightsaber, debating on the merits of knocking versus barging in, when the door opened and someone came out to greet me.

I stared up into Count Dooku's flashing black eyes, and for a moment wondered if I'd lost my mind. “But you're dead,” I managed to say.

He smiled, his expression oozing infuriating condescension. “Of course not. You were merely meant to believe so.” He looked pleased. “Clones are such useful things, are they not? With the Republic convinced of my death, I was free to do my Master's work.”

“I suppose so,” I said, igniting my lightsaber, getting over my initial shock. “I guess that explains the rumors of another Sith Apprentice.”

He laughed. “My Lord Sidious does indeed have a new apprentice, Obi-Wan. But I am not he.”

I lowered my lightsaber blade, frowning. “That doesn't seem to be in line with Sith policy.”

Dooku - Darth Tyrannus - chuckled as if I had just made a joke. “Things change, Obi-Wan. Evolution is the way of the universe.”

Somehow, I couldn't bring myself to be surprised. The Sith had broken the Rule of Two. Great. For all I knew, I was walking into an entire building of Sith. Oh, well. I always did like a challenge. “Ignite that lightsaber or get the hell out of my way,” I said, striding forward.

Tyrannus ignited his dark red lightsaber, holding it out in one smooth motion. “You should not have come back, Obi-Wan. You have proved yourself worthy to be my Padawan's final student. I will almost be sorry to kill you.”

“I'm happy to tell you that I don't feel the same way,” I replied, moving to catch his lightsaber on mine when he lashed out with lightning speed. Dooku might have been trying to unbalance me with his unexpected appearance, but instead it had hardened my resolve. “Is Sidious's other new apprentice a clone, then? Or are you the clone?”

Dooku frowned, lightning formed, and I sent the burst of electricity skidding away from me with my blade. “I am no clone!” Dooku roared, spinning around to cleave at my neck with his lightsaber. I met his blade with ease. War had taught me much about the way of the lightsaber, more than I'd ever imagined. Not to mention the slew of dirty tricks I'd learned from the Mandalorians. I swung my lightsaber again, and as he moved to catch my blade, I ducked around him and kicked him in the side of his knee as hard as I could.

He howled as his leg crumpled, rage lighting his features as he parried my strike and lunged out. I almost sneered at him, swatting the blade out of my way. For all of his talk of evolution, Dooku had never managed to step away from the second form of _makashi._ In the meantime, I'd been learning them all. I stepped into the _vapaad_ , letting the erratic movement carry my lightsaber from a guard position into a furious attack that Dooku couldn't keep up with. My blade went through his arm at the crook of his elbow, and the hand that gripped his lightsaber fell to the ground. I kicked his lightsaber away, leveling my blade at his throat.

He looked at the blade, then up at me, raising an eyebrow at our position. “You have me at a disadvantage, it seems,” he said, his tone once again as calm as if we were having tea. “I applaud your skill, Master Kenobi.”

“Shut up,” I said, not wishing to hear compliments from him. I had only one question, something I had wished to know the answer to since I had first found him in charge of the Separatists on Geonosis - right before he had me tortured for refusing to join him. “Why?” I wanted to know why Qui-Gon's Master had joined the Sith in bringing hell to the galaxy.

His eyes narrowed, and I could sense an attack forming. “You don't know the power of the Dark side.”

“Wrong answer,” I muttered, my lightsaber removing his head from his shoulders before he could unleash the energy he'd been building. I raised my arm to cover my face as corrupt fire exploded outward, shielding myself with the Force to keep from being burned by Darth Tyrannus's death. The blaze faded away, and I stared at the dark stain that marred the stone, trying to figure out what I was feeling.

Nothing. I felt nothing. Not even pleasure at still being alive, at having one less Sith in the galaxy.

A clone. It made a brutal kind of sense. Why else would Dooku have put himself into that kind of position? If he'd been that poor a strategist to begin with, the war would have gone a lot differently. Anakin himself had been bewildered with how easily he had disarmed Dooku, even with the vast improvement of skill he'd managed. _“It was like I was fighting someone who had no interest in winning,”_ he'd said, when we'd spoken about the battle later. I hadn't known what to tell him, since I'd been unconscious for most of the confrontation. I had fallen with such strange, frightening ease, when the Chanc— Oh.

I paused in the midst of walking into the main hall of the Emperor’s residence. Well. That certainly explained that. With me out of the way, Palpatine would have been free to manipulate Anakin. The _Invisible Hand -_ even the name of the ship the Chancellor had been held 'prisoner' on was a joke. I ignored the little voice that snickered at me: if Palpatine could put me under with so little effort, this attack was going to end badly.

I looked up at the ebony walls, decorated in flags of red and black that were embossed with Sith sigils that I couldn’t even begin to translate, but filled me with revulsion. It wasn’t even a lifetime of being a Jedi that created the reaction. I just knew they represented terrible things. That, and something about the Sith alphabet made my head ache. The entire place was dank and cold, and all I wanted to do was curl up under my robe and try to warm myself. I could smell blood, a coppery odor that was hidden underneath a sickly sweet incense. I wondered what Palpatine’s loving constituents would think if they saw this place, his true residence, instead of that pretty little apartment in the upper levels.

I had one goal: to kill the person who had befriended my brother and turned him into a monster that willingly slaughtered children. I made my way through the palace and left bodies in my wake: Dooku, a score of stormtroopers, and two members of the Imperial Guard were just an unexpected bonus. I looked at the two red-robed guards lying on the floor with smoking blaster wounds, then tossed my blaster down to join them. They'd expected to fight a lightsaber, not a blaster, but I knew that advantage was now gone. Leaving them behind, I kept going. I was only one room away from finding out what I had gotten myself into. One Sith down - again. Hopefully there were only two more to go.

I found Palpatine sitting in a mini-recreation of the Galactic throne that had replaced the Chancellor’s box. Other than that the room was empty, the black walls and ceiling making it just as dark and gloomy as the rest of the place.

Palpatine was wearing a hood low over his face, casting his features into shadow. The Chancellor's blue robes of office had been abandoned in favor of a simple black cloak. “Ah, General Kenobi.” He rose in one fluid motion, swinging his arms wide, mocking, to show that he was unarmed. “I’ve been expecting you.”

“I suppose you were,” I replied, holding my lightsaber down by my side. Its pale blue glow was the only bright source of light in the room. I wasn’t sure what I’d expected from the Sith, but a warm greeting was not anywhere on the list.

“We missed you when Order Sixty-Six was issued,” Palpatine said, taking a step down from the raised dais, stopping when I raised my lightsaber warningly. The Sith’s smile was just visible beneath the cowl of his hood. “There’s no need for that, Obi-Wan. We’re all friends here.”

I snorted. “You had my friends murdered. I think that might make our continued relations a bit difficult.” _Force and gods_ , I thought. I was actually standing here making verbal parries with the monster.

“Yes, I suppose it was a bit…drastic,” he said, chuckling, and then pulled his hood back.

I took a step back, horrified. I hadn’t seen Palpatine since he had proclaimed his injuries, but this was worse than I could have guessed. Palpatine’s eyes had gone yellow, and glowed with their own malevolence. They highlighted the bruised skin around his eyes, the veins that twisted his features, and the sallowness of his skin. Long-term abuse of spice couldn’t even compare. I’d seen rotting corpses that were less revolting. “The Sith have been waiting a millennium for their revenge, Jedi. I wish there had been time to savor it more.”

I stared at the ruin of humanity that Palpatine had become. “Revenge?” My grip tightened on my lightsaber, the names of the lost ringing in my head. “That wasn’t revenge! It was fucking genocide, and you well know it!”

“Mmm.” Palpatine closed his eyes, as if savoring the thought. “And what better form of revenge? A thousand years ago, the Jedi committed their own form of genocide against the Sith, and only one of us remained. Now, the Jedi have almost been brought to the same fate. The circle will be complete.” He opened his eyes, glaring at me, and visceral hatred battered against my mind. It hit me as a near-physical blow, such was the strength of the rage that Palpatine projected. This was what Yoda had been halted by - the raw ability that Palpatine had masked from the Jedi for over twenty years.

“Soon, there will be only one of you,” Palpatine whispered, then laughed. “And he is my servant.” He smiled, gleeful and childlike in his happiness. “Would you like to meet him?”

“Certainly,” I said, with a lightheartedness that I didn’t feel. “I can kill him after I kill you.”

Palpatine nodded, still chuckling, as if I were the subject of a great joke. “Of course you will.” He held out a hand, beckoning.

A shadow that I hadn’t noticed, stationed by the throne, moved. It gained height as it stood, towering over us both. I resisted the urge to step back. _Whoever this is, it doesn't matter_ , I told myself. I was going to do what I came here to do.

For a moment I flashed on Anakin, burning and spitting hatred at me, and I gritted my teeth. The shadow stepped forward, revealing a bipedal form that was a least a full head and a half taller than I was. He was enshrouded by a black metal life support system that looked as it if had been designed to be as menacing as possible. A black robe swirled around black-clad legs, and a shining armored helmet and expressionless mask completed the ensemble. The shadow looked like some diseased artist’s idea of Death.

“What is thy bidding, my Master?” the shadow asked in a deep, resonating voice.

The world went swimming away. I fell to my knees, trying not to retch. Gods. Gods, Force, ghosts and demons. Death was better. Death was far, far better than this. It didn’t matter that the voice was changed, deepened, by a vocorder embedded in the mask, or that his essence in the Force was a blighted, twisted thing.

I would know Anakin Skywalker anywhere.

“Obi-Wan Kenobi, you already know Darth Vader,” Palpatine said, gesturing towards him with a grand flourish.

“How?” I whispered, staring at the polished floor. I could see the image of the two of them reflected on it, and even that was almost too much.

Palpatine stepped forward and reached up, caressing the armored shoulder lovingly. “I have my own bond with my apprentice, Obi-Wan. It allowed me to find him after Master Yoda’s foolish attack on me in the Senate. You left him on Mustafar, believing him dead, but he was not. He clawed his way from the lava, ready to be given a new life, in a new form.” Palpatine smiled. “Ready to truly become mine.” He chuckled. “The ancient prophecy is fulfilled, my friend.”

His eyes glinting in triumph, Palpatine turned to me. I met his eyes as he spoke words that chilled me to the core: _“And the Light and the Dark shall make the One, and the Force will be Balanced.”_

It sounded like the Prophecy of the Chosen One, but distorted. How could Palpatine know—

I stopped thinking, too stunned to continue. I realized how completely the Sith had fooled the Jedi. How completely the Sith had fooled us all, for hundreds of years.

“It was never about restoring balance,” I whispered. “It was about destroying it.”

Palpatine waved a hand dismissively. “From your own misguided point of view, perhaps. Not for the Sith.” He continued to speak, but I didn't hear him.

For over two years, I had tried not to feel. I hadn’t thought about Anakin, or Padmé, or the twins. Until I woke up on the _Tantive IV_ , I’d given little thought to the Jedi falling under enemy fire where there should have only been allies. I had put Utapau and the clones out of my head, trying not to remember that one terrible moment of betrayal.

I felt it all, all at once.

I felt rage.

There was no thought. If there had been thought, Palpatine would have used some Sith technique to defend himself. I charged headlong, lightsaber blazing, directly for the man who was responsible for literal Hell unleashed upon the galaxy.

I had forgotten Vader.

An arm that felt like it had been molded from duracrete caught me across the midsection, knocking all of the air from my lungs. Another arm of duracrete caught me across the shoulders with enough force to send me crashing to the floor. I slid across the polished tiles, coming to rest in a pained heap halfway across the room.

I forced myself onto my back, scooting backwards on my hands and feet as the great looming hulk of Darth Vader steadily approached. Something ground painfully together inside me, and my lungs were cramping with the effort of drawing breath. I didn't recover fast enough, and leather glove-clad hands seized me by my tunics, lifting me from the floor with ease. I gasped, still struggling to take a decent gulp of air. Broken ribs again, I thought, and wondered if I’d live long enough for the damage to be healed.

“Greetings, Obi-Wan,” Vader said to me. I stared at the places in the mask that were meant to represent eyes, and found the soulless visage quite appropriate. It suited Darth Vader very well. “I trust you like my new Master’s upgrades.”

Upgrades? “Turning a human into a tank isn’t an upgrade, it’s overkill,” I retorted.

I was dropped, none too gently, onto my back again. My ribs protested so much that I thought I was going to faint. “You should be happy, Obi-Wan. These changes were wrought by your hand.”

I stared at Vader and remembered the security vids from the Temple of children dying. “You’re right,” I said, calling my lightsaber back to my hand. The hilt hit my palm, and I ignited the blade and brought it up just in time for a bright red lightsaber blade to come crashing down at me. The blow rattled my teeth, but I managed to keep Vader’s lightsaber from driving its way through my body.

Darth Vader stepped back, robes swirling around his armored form, waiting for me to struggle to my feet. “I am what the Jedi made me. They had nothing but contempt for me. They did not trust me. But you…” he raised his lightsaber again, his enhanced voice full of anger. “You were my friend! You betrayed me!”

I wanted to scream. “Betrayed you? Anakin, you murdered children! What would you have done in my place?” I yelled, advancing on him.

For a moment the red blade faltered, and I noticed Palpatine’s genial smile turn into a snarl. Then Vader pulled himself to his full height, staring down at me. “I made my decision for the good of the galaxy. The Jedi made the wrong choice. Now the war is over, and there is peace. The lives I took ended a conflict that had gone on for far too long.”

Padmé’s last words to me seemed laughable. Good, in this creature? “I saw the recordings, Anakin! You killed Liam – did you think about what you were doing?! Did you realize you were killing the child who was meant to be your Padawan?”

This time his lightsaber did not hesitate – it flew towards me with deadly intent. I ducked out of the way and realized too late that I had misjudged Anakin’s new body. I found myself held in the air once more, this time by my throat, faster than I would have thought possible. I choked, my feet dangling in midair, and grabbed the gloved wrists with my hands in desperation. Darth Vader’s strength was immense, and I couldn’t even budge his grip. “You don’t know what happened! You weren’t there!” Vader bellowed at me in rage.

“Then tell me!” I gasped out, my vision graying around the edges. I could barely make out Palpatine, still standing by the dais, who seemed ready to clap his hands in glee. “Tell me, Anakin!”

The iron grip around my throat eased enough for me to breathe, though he did not let go. “Palpatine told me who he was. He told me all of it! I did what I was supposed to do, Obi-Wan! I told the Council, and Windu. All I wanted was to go with them, to be a part of them! And he refused! He refused, and told me if what I said was true, he’d finally trust me!” Vader’s voice was choked with rage. It was the rage of a slighted child – maybe even a genuinely slighted child – but that made it no less dangerous. “He should have trusted me already!”

“Wasn’t very nice of him,” I gasped out, wondering how long Vader could hold me like this. Probably forever, the way things looked. It didn’t bode well for my plan of killing the smiling happy bastard on the dais. “What- what happened?”

“I waited in the Council chamber like I was told. I thought about what would happen, and wondered what _you_ would do. You would have helped them arrest the Chancellor, wouldn’t you have?” Vader’s mask came closer, as if to check that I was really paying attention. I nodded. “When I got there, Master Windu was trying to kill him! He was just supposed to arrest Palpatine! That’s what Jedi are supposed to do – dispense justice! Murder isn’t justice!”

I thought about pointing out that murder was exactly what Palpatine had ordered Anakin to carry out, and then thought better of it. I didn’t know if my next words would convince Vader to let me go, or if he would crush my throat like a handy twig. “No, Anakin. Murder isn’t justice. I don’t understand. If you thought Palpatine had done wrong, then why—”

“Because he never lied to me,” Vader replied, his metallic voice punctuating every word. “You are the only other person alive that can say the same, which is why you still breathe.” He lifted me higher, and I tried to swallow around the uncomfortable pressure on my throat. “You said the Sith are evil. Am I evil, Obi-Wan? Answer me truthfully, or your death will be even more painful than the one you gave to me.”

I stared at him, stunned by the dichotomy Vader presented. He was insane, that I was sure of. Anakin’s mind wasn’t just darkened, it was fractured. I didn't know if the fracture had occurred before or after he'd destroyed his bond with his wife, but it had certainly made things worse.

Anakin Skywalker was not evil, but Darth Vader undeniably was. They both lived in the same damaged mind. For a moment I thought about the bright child I had once met in the hold of a queen’s starship, and tried to figure out how everything we had done together came down to this. “What could he have told you that would turn you against everyone who cared about you?” I asked in a whisper. That was what I did not understand.

“There are secrets that the Sith know, that the Jedi do not. The power of life over death…” Vader leaned close, though the pitch of his computer-modulated voice did not change. “He told me he could save her. I will bring her back, Obi-Wan. My wife will be with me again one day. Death will not keep me from her. But…” and now he sounded much more purposeful. “Death will certainly keep you away from me.” Vader raised his lightsaber.

I watched the rest blade descend, and I knew I could not leave Anakin alone now. If there was any chance to save him, to repair the damage to his mind, then I had to try. I could not let Palpatine win without a fight. Some part of me, as angry as I was, would not settle for it - not while I could still sense some last vestiges of Anakin Skywalker in the form of Darth Vader.

“Show me,” I mouthed, unable to gain enough air to say the words out loud.

The blade hesitated. “What?”

“Show me,” I choked out, when the grip on my throat eased enough for me to breathe again. “Show me why…you would choose this path. Convince me that you’ve done the right thing.”

“Why would I want to do that?” Vader asked, holding perfectly still. Behind him, I could see that Palpatine was studying me with his dark gaze, and I shuddered at his obvious interest.

“You know me…Ani.” I took a cautious breath, relieved when Vader did not react to the childhood name with anger. “You know me. If you change my mind, then it means that you were right…about everything.”

Vader lowered me to the ground, but did not release his grip. I spent a moment trying to gather my wits – it was so damned hard to think in this place. Besides, if Vader had released me, I would have lunged straight for Palpatine again. “What do you think, Master?” Vader asked the Sith Lord.

“I sense treachery, my apprentice. He has betrayed you once. Don’t you think he will do it again?” Palpatine asked, his fingers tapping together as if the thought had just occurred to him.

Vader turned back to me, and I glared at him. “A betrayal for a betrayal, Anakin,” I hissed.

He studied me, his face impossible to read behind the mask. “You would really do this for me? You would see all that the Sith have to offer the galaxy?”

I nodded, even though the thought went against everything I believed. If anything, I was gaining time. The longer I breathed, the more chance I still had of destroying Darth Sidious. “I shouldn’t have left you there. I won’t leave you here.”

Palpatine raised a baleful eyebrow. “So be it, Jedi. You will learn.”

I growled at him. “I am not afraid of you, and I never will be.”

Palpatine smiled, and it was that familiar, oily political smile that I had always hated. “We will see.”

 

*          *          *          *

           

Palpatine had been right, damn him. Everything that I encountered in that dark place made me more frightened than I had ever been in my entire life. Even the fact that I was allowed to keep my lightsaber didn't reassure me.

It was the end of that same day, but it felt like time had simply…stopped. The only reason I knew time hadn't ceased to exist was because of the chrono strapped to my wrist, still counting seconds, minutes, hours. Six hours spent here was already far too long.

I wasn't allowed to leave, but I was surprised to find that I could go anywhere in Sidious' residence unmolested. I did what I could to heal the damage to my ribs, then roamed the dark halls with a glow rod. The strategist in me was insistent upon learning everything about this place. One day the information could come in handy, even if it was just knowing the best way to destroy it.

The first level, the one I had entered, was home to the recreated throne, as well as Palpatine's personal apartments. There were other sleeping quarters, and I guessed that even though I saw no one, those rooms had owners.

Vader's retreat was a black hermetic sphere that sealed its occupant inside, and the very sight of it made me ill.

The second floor had a kitchen, and I lightened the stores as I passed through. It was staffed by droids, and they ignored me as they worked at various tasks. If the food was meant for Palpatine, the chances of it being poisoned were slim. Next to the kitchen was an empty dining hall. Beyond that was a corridor, and every door in it was locked with an electronic cardkey reader. A short hall connected it to another corridor, full of more locked doors.

I saw the occasional stormtrooper, and more of the red-cloaked Imperial guards. Sometimes I saw other humans, all male, cloaked and silent. I wasn't sure if they were avoiding me, or if I was avoiding them.

There was a library at the end of the third corridor I found, filled with many well-preserved paper tomes and data disks. A raised dais in the center of the room was home to three holocrons, all of them embossed with the sigils of the Sith alphabet. I walked past the spines of books, shining the light on them long enough to see that I didn't have a chance of reading them. I lowered the glow rod, all of my thoughts halted by a horrible realization. I was standing in a room that held all of the arcane lore of the Sith - or at least as much as they had collected over the past millennia. Not even Korriban could lay claim to this much dark knowledge.

I had to quell my first instinct, which was to torch the place. Now that I was here and no longer under threat of immediate death, I wasn't inclined to do something that would be tantamount to suicide. I didn't think Sidious planned to indulge his apprentice for very long.

“Haven't you ever been curious?”

I spun in place, my heart hammering in my chest, to find Palpatine only a few steps away. “How the fuck did you do that?!” I shouted, my heart rate skyrocketing. If there was one thing I hadn't done, it was forget to be mindful of my surroundings! Until he had spoken, I'd been certain that I was alone in the room.

He smiled at me, walking in the direction of the dais. The cloak was low over his face again, disguising most of his features. “As my apprentice told you, General. There are secrets that the Sith know that the Jedi do not. Aren't you curious to find out what those things are?”

“No,” I said, regaining control of my heartbeat. It bothered me how much Palpatine's sudden presence left me in a near-panicked state. “No. I have never been curious.”

“Hmm. You speak the truth, and yet…” He touched the largest holocron on the dais, enough for the recognition system to pulse once in return but not activate. “Here you are.”

“We both know why I'm here,” I retorted, my fingers itching to go for my lightsaber.

“Ahh, yes. To kill me,” he laughed, a quiet sound that echoed throughout the library. “Tell me: What's stopping you from killing me now?”

My jaw clenched until it ached. I said nothing, glaring at him in quiet fury.

He took a deep breath and lifted his head, as if scenting the air. “I can feel your anger, but you do not give in to it. Why not?”

“Because that is not the Jedi way.”

Sidious smiled again. “And yet…here you are.” He walked away, chuckling, and I could only stare at his retreating form, knowing that he was right.

When I was sure he wouldn't return, I went back to the holocrons, a chill running down my spine. Knowledge and defense were the ways of the Jedi. Know your enemy, and you can defend against him. I touched the triangular ridge of the smallest Sith holocron, and it was cold under my fingertips, whispering of dark things even when not active. I grimaced and picked it up, appalled at what I was doing and knowing I had no choice. The Order's knowledge of the Sith was mostly based on legend, and I had to learn more about what I was dealing with. My survival depended on it. Anakin's fate depended on it.

I must have managed to press the right sigils, because the holographic matrix activated. “Saghatha voe, saghatha huth na,” a voice with electronic distortion in it spoke. The field stabilized, and I saw that the holocron had produced a humanoid male, tattooed and hairless, with a cybernetic replacement for a jaw. “Brac'ti yar—”

“Shut up,” I said, and the hologram fell silent. “Do you speak Basic?”

“I do speak Basic. Who seeks the wisdom of the Sith?”

“A Jedi,” I snapped. “What is the way of the Sith?”

“Treachery,” he answered. “Conflict. Chaos. All of these roads lead to power. The Sith have a code much like the Jedi. Would you like to hear it?”

“Not really.” The Sith hologram continued on as if I hadn't spoken.

“Peace is a lie, there is only passion.

Through passion, I gain strength.

Through strength, I gain power.

Through power, I gain victory.

Through victory, my chains are broken.

The Force shall free me.”

I raised an eyebrow. “That's a nice way of trying to mislead people,” I murmured. Pretty words for following a path that always led to self-destruction.

The Sith's image grew stronger, and there was anger in his voice when he spoke again. “I was not mislead. My name is Darth Malek, and I chose my path well. I was once a Jedi, like you, who discovered the truth.”

“What truth?” I asked, fascinated in spite of myself. Darth Malek was another legend - one over three thousand years old. He had forsaken the Order, bringing chaos to a galaxy that was still recovering from the great Sith War some years before.

When the Sith spoke again, his words were quiet but strong. “Our Council was corrupt. My best friend and I left Republic space, searching for a way to end the conflicts that were threatening to tear the Jedi apart. We found Korriban, and the tombs of the Sith. Even in death, they were strong, powerful. They saw our strengths, our desire - and we became their successors. I was Darth Revan's Apprentice. When I killed him, I became the Master, and imprinted myself upon this holocron. We brought a cleansing fire to the Republic. With our truth, we brought an end to the destruction that was rendering the galaxy asunder.”

“With more destruction?” I shook my head. “You speak of Darth Revan as your best friend, but in my experience, killing someone sort of puts a damper on the relationship.”

“That is the way of the Sith, Jedi,” Darth Malek intoned. “We fight and die, so that only the strong will lead us. It is only those with the strongest of wills who are fit to rule.”

 

*          *          *          *

 

No one ever directed me to any particular place, so when I felt the need to sleep, I made my way down to the first true sub-level. One room wasn't locked, and I ducked inside. The air was so stale I had to hold my breath at first. Once the room had a chance to fill with fresh air I closed the door and scrambled the electrical lock on it. I paused, noticed a dusty table, and shoved it against the door for good measure. It wouldn't keep out anyone who really wanted in - who was I kidding, anyway? - but it made me feel better.

On the third day I started overriding locks. Most of Sidious's residence was like a blight in the Force, and the second level was particularly bad. There were labs in some rooms, and I got my first look at the ancient arts of Sith alchemy. What little I saw was going to give me nightmares. I'd roamed one lab long enough to catch sight of a creature that looked like it had been fused to an ion cannon and decided enough was enough.

One room had a door that shrieked when it opened, a sign that it had been a long time since anyone had bothered with it. A smell that I had not encountered in over twenty years assaulted my nostrils. Sidious's first apprentice, the one he had called Darth Maul. I thought about it for a moment, then sealed the door again. As far as I was concerned, Maul's ghost could remain buried.

Sidious kept pets, and one was a creature that had not been seen in two thousand years. Hssiss. I escaped from that particular room with a long tear in my cloak but my skin intact, thank the Force. I was in no mood to try and figure out how to filter a toxin from a creature even Master Yoda had thought extinct.

I was holding my cloak in my arms as I went down the corridor when I found Vader. Or he found me. Either way, one moment there was nothing, and the next he was gliding out of the shadows. I'm not ashamed to admit that I jumped. “Blast it all! Is there some Sith rule that says you have to walk out of the fucking walls?”

Vader merely stared at me, his arms crossed against his chest.

“Right,” I muttered. I guess I would have to do the talking for both of us. “I met some of Palpatine's friends that he keeps downstairs,” I said, holding up my cloak so that the new tear was visible. “While normally I'm all for the conservation of a species, I think the galaxy could do without the Hssiss.”

“The Hssiss? Were you injured?” he asked. For a moment I almost thought I detected a note of concern in his voice, then thought better of it. _Don't look for hope where it may not exist._

“Oh, now you're speaking to me,” I said sarcastically. “No, I'm not injured. One of them might be, since I kicked its teeth in.”

“Good. I would hate to have to save your life again.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Nice to see you can still make a joke.”

“I wasn't joking.” For a long moment there was nothing but the sound of his life support armor breathing for him. I had no idea what to say in reply - especially when I had been the one to leave him to die. “Come with me, Obi-Wan,” he said at last, turning and striding down the corridor.

I followed, curious. Besides, I hadn't seen him since Palpatine had agreed to my staying here. If I wanted a chance at all of trying to reach Anakin inside that black shell, I was going to have to spend time in Darth Vader's company.

He entered a room at the end of the hall with a wave of his hand, and I made a note of it. Palpatine and Vader must both be encoded to the security system's recognition software, but I wasn't sure how. It couldn't have been a palm reader, as Vader wore gloves at all times.

Vader stood in the center of the empty room, waiting for me to stop a few paces a way. “Activate,” he said. With that a three-dimensional holographic map appeared, swirling around us. Unlike the lost star-map of the Temple, this one was color-coded by territory. I looked around, noticing the proliferation of red stars - all worlds that had once been part of the Republic, now called the Empire. Then I looked again - the worlds I had gotten used to seeing under the banner of the Confederation were also red, as were some systems that had never been aligned with the Republic. There was a blue section to represent Wild Space, and even a system on that fringe was marked in red. The Unknown Regions were marked in green, but there were three red lines going into the green.

“You're sending people into the Unknown Regions?” It would be the first time anyone had done so since Outbound Flight had disappeared years before.

Vader nodded. “My Master senses that there are useful allies to be found there.” He spread his arms wide. “Does anything in particular catch your eye, _Master?_ ” I didn't mistake the mocking tone he'd placed on that title. All things considered, why he thought something that childish was going to bother me... I hid a smile that he would not have understood. Palpatine might have turned my friend, but he'd taken away something fundamental in the process. Vader was, in a way, more childish than Anakin had ever been even when he _was_ a child.

“Did those systems join the Empire willingly, or were they forced to?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

Vader crossed his arms, looking even more like a bipedal battle tank. “Some joined the Empire willingly. Others were... encouraged to do so.”

“Encouraged?” I shook my head. “You were always lousy at diplomacy.” I looked at the swirling points of light. Even the Corellian system was marked in red, though I knew the Empire was having difficulties there. Imperial patrols inside Corellian space kept meeting with unfortunate and unexplainable 'accidents'. “Why are you showing me this?”

“You asked me to show you why I chose this path, Obi-Wan.” He uncrossed his arms and waved his hand at the hologram. “Show only Imperial holdings,” he instructed, and the hologram immediately ditched the full galactic view in favor of an enlarged view of the Galactic Empire. It was bigger than the Republic had ever been. “This is why. After years of war and strife, we have peace. Even the Hutts have bowed to the might of the Empire.”

“Subjugation is not the path to peace—you used to know this.”

“I have helped to end a conflict that took millions of lives,” he said, and I could sense him growing angry.

“I thought conflict was the way of the Sith,” I said, for some reason taking a perverse amount of enjoyment from his anger. “You don't seem to be very good at this Dark Lord thing yet.”

“Why can I not have both, Obi-Wan?” he said, and the anger had grown, but he was controlling it. I had to give him credit - Anakin had lost his temper more easily than Darth Vader did. “The way of the Jedi was flawed. The way of the Sith is flawed - we both know this. Why can I not walk both paths? Subjugation has brought an end to conflict. If peace must come from an iron fist of control, then so be it. There will be balance.”

I opened my mouth to reply and froze, horrified. This is what that stupid prophecy came down to? Peace through tyranny? Light giving in to darkness? I took a step back and found words. “End hologram.” I didn't need to look at the width and breadth of the power Sidious had obtained any longer. “You are a fool if you think you can keep the Dark side from destroying you, Anakin.”

“Do not call me that,” Vader said, taking a step towards me threateningly.

I realized then that while Anakin sometimes held sway, right now I was dealing with no one but Vader. I crossed my arms and stood my ground, refusing to be intimidated. “Make me.”

Vader hesitated. I don't think it was a response he had seen a lot of since his transformation. “Don't make me destroy you over something so trivial, Obi-Wan.”

“Anakin, Anakin, Anakin,” I taunted. _By the Force, I think I really do have a death wish._

His lightsaber appeared in his hand, the blood red blade emerging from the hilt. In the same moment I had mine, and we crossed blades, blue over red. We stood facing each other, unmoving. “Look, I'm not in the mood for this,” I said, watching for him to move. “I agreed to stay here if you could convince me that this way was best. So far, you're doing a bad job of that.”

“What would you have had me do, Obi-Wan?” he asked.

“Anything but this,” I said, my voice quiet. “There is always another way. The Senate's corruption was faltering in the face of that conflict. They were learning that other things were more important. With time, perhaps, the entire reason the Confederacy abdicated could have been resolved.”

“There was no time for that! I brought an end to their corruption!” Vader roared.

“This is the ultimate corruption!” I shouted back, my temper flaring. “You murdered thousands to obtain this damned peace of yours!”

Vader didn't move, but I sensed he was holding back by the barest of margins. “Are you here to kill me, Obi-Wan?”

“I'm certainly tempted,” I snapped. “But no: I came here to kill that black-hearted monster you now call Master. I've tried to kill you quite enough for one lifetime, thank you _very_ much.” If I had to, I would kill him - yet I knew I would be ripping out what was left of my heart to do so. I wanted to avoid another duel with Darth Vader if I could.

To my surprise, he lowered his lightsaber and powered it down. “Good. I do not yet want you dead, Obi-Wan. In time, perhaps, there will be a final battle between us. But you agreed to stay in a place I know you abhor, and I would be a fool to destroy a potential ally so soon.”

I lowered my lightsaber, disengaging the blade, because I knew he spoke the truth. I had nothing to more to fear from Vader today, though tomorrow might be a different story.

“The Dark side will not destroy me, Obi-Wan. I will master it. When I have done so, I will destroy Lord Sidious and take his place.”

I'd heard him make that offer once already, and I knew he meant it. I also knew that Darth Vader would never be capable of doing what he said. Sidious had subjugated my Padawan as thoroughly as he had the Republic. I realized then what the major trap of the Dark side was for Anakin. He had always treated the Force more as a tool and less as a path to walk. He used it - very rarely had Anakin allowed the Force to use him. Vader thought he was standing at the edge of darkness, when in truth he was immersed in it. “You'll forgive me if I don't give you a rousing endorsement.”

Vader tilted his head as if in thought. “Perhaps you will join me, if given time. Will you do something for me, Obi-Wan?”

I didn't like the sound of that. Whatever he was going to ask of me, it could not possibly be good. “That depends entirely on what it is.”

“As you like to remind me, I am not a diplomat. I do not have the words to persuade you of the rightness of my path. I do not yet have the knowledge of the Sith, though I am learning. Will you allow my Master to help with this?”

 _Abso-fucking-lutely not,_ I thought, the idea so appalling that every muscle in my abdomen clenched in revulsion.

“I thought I would find you both here,” Palpatine said.

I turned my head to see him standing in the doorway. This time I didn't jump, but I was really getting tired of that bastard sneaking up on me. “I'm sure it was just a polite coincidence.”

Palpatine gave me a smile that was all teeth before turning his attention to Vader. “Lord Vader, I have an urgent matter that requires your presence. You must leave immediately for Malastare. You will find instructions waiting with your personal shuttle.”

Vader bowed. “As you wish, my Master,” he said before taking his leave.

I watched him go. “Service without question. How you must enjoy that.”

“It is one of the benefits to being a Master of the Sith,” Palpatine chuckled. “Would you not enjoy someone obeying you without question, General Kenobi?”

“No. That would get old really fast.” Even most of the clones had been sensible enough to speak up about any order they thought was problematic. Those of Mandalorian stock had little patience for ineptitude.

Palpatine looked at me as if doubting the veracity of my words. Let him doubt all he damned well pleased. I stared at him in silence, and he finally spoke. “I sought you out to ask if you would join me for dinner.”

“The very thought makes me consider the benefits of starvation,” I said, despite my stomach reminding me that it had been almost a day since I'd last eaten.

“Come now, my friend,” he said, and that made my lips twist with disgust. He ignored my quiet opinion on the matter of our friendship. “You have shared many a meal with me in the past as we discussed matters.”

“Oh? And how many times had you tried to kill me then?”

He paused, considering. “At least four different times, depending on the date in question. You are a very difficult man to kill, Master Kenobi.”

 _Fuck it,_ I thought. The only difference between then and now was that at least this time I knew who I was really sharing a meal with. “Lead the way.”

The table that now graced the dining hall was a glossy black that blended in with the rest of the room. If the plates, flatware, and drinking vessels had been black, I would have started to doubt my sanity. Those, at least, were a serviceable white, and the food was the expensive fare that he had always served to guests while Chancellor. The meal was brought out not by the droids I expected, but by two dour-faced women dressed in simple black robes. “Where did they come from?”

Palpatine waved a hand to direct them away from the table, and they disappeared into the kitchens without expression or comment. “I have a staff, though they come and go. I find their presence tiresome.”

 _You would,_ I thought, as I scanned every single morsel I'd been served with the Force. I wasn't taking any chances on being poisoned. I sensed nothing, and tried not to down food like a starving rancor. I was going to have to remember to steal from his kitchen more often. I didn't need to give him an excuse to extend this invitation again.

The women returned, trying to serve wine that I refused, motioning politely for water. It had a mineral aftertaste that I didn't associate with Coruscant's water supply, but it wouldn't surprise me if Palpatine imported it. I gave it a curious look, though it otherwise smelled and tasted just like water, and I sensed nothing untoward from it. Shrugging to myself, I looked up at Palpatine, who was having trouble eating even the slight amount of food in his plate. “You don't seem to eat very much of late,” I commented.

He was unconcerned. “There are some side effects to fully embracing the Dark side,” he admitted. “Our bodies can be consumed by the power we wield. It is a small price to pay.”

“You know, that's interesting,” I said. “I have seen Jedi Masters wield incredible amounts of power, and that power leaves them vital and full of health. To me that has always spoken volumes about the wrongness of what it is you do.”

“Greatness demands sacrifice,” was his only comment, his tone derisive. “All of those great wielders of power you speak of are dead now. Here I sit. Perhaps your point of view is misguided.”

“Doubtful,” I said. “Why did you send Vader to Malastare?” I asked, suspicious. The timing was rather suspect.

“My spies have discovered a rebel cell there, with evidence that a Jedi is hiding among them. Vader will wipe out the cell and destroy the Jedi. We will quash this fledgling Alliance before it ever has a chance to gain power.” I glared at him, and he chuckled. “Oh yes, Obi-Wan. I do know about your precious Alliance. Rest assured, your friends will be dealt with, one by one.”

“You've already destroyed us,” I said, keeping a firm grasp on my anger. “Why can't you leave the remaining Jedi alone?”

“Because my revenge is not yet complete,” he snarled. “The purges will continue. The Jedi will be no more. The Alliance will die.”

“You will never be able to stop the Rebellion, even if you destroy every single bit of the Alliance,” I said, baring my teeth in an expression that was more challenging snarl than smile. “Not even you can control the mind of every single being in the galaxy.”

Palpatine smiled. “Not yet, no. In time, however…”

I paused in the midst of reaching for my glass. “No one is that powerful. Not even Anakin.”

“Alone, no, he is not. Alas.” Palpatine smacked his lips as if savoring that particular thought. “But the Kaminoans were kind enough to introduce their cloning technology to the galaxy, and I do have a treasure trove of Spaarti cloning cylinders. I can always solve that particular problem.”

I snorted in amused disbelief. “You may want to consider speaking to your apprentice before you decide to steal his genetic material. Besides, Anakin cannot be cloned.”

Palpatine's gaze turned sharp. “And how do you know this?”

I felt that feral smile return to my face. “Did your last apprentice not tell you?” I laughed at Palpatine's angry frown. “Dooku tried to clone Anakin during the war after he stole cloning supplies from Kamino. It doesn't work. Something in Anakin's blood doesn't allow for it - we suspected it might have something to do with his disproportionate midichlorian count.”

Palpatine shrugged. “A pity.” He looked at me again. “I suppose then, that I must thank you for dispensing with Darth Tyrannus. It saved me the difficulty of having to do it myself.”

“I didn't do it for you,” I growled.

“Of course you didn't,” he said, placing his elbows on the table and resting his chin in his hands, staring at me with a very disquieting grin.

I paused, looking down at the glass of water I held, feeling the first bit of cold seep into my limbs. I sighed, put the glass down, and scowled at him. “You son of a bitch.”

His grin widened, full of gleeful malice. “If only you had taken the wine.” He stood up as I shoved my chair back, getting away from the table. Already my limbs felt dead, and the chill was spreading.

“What is it?” I asked, falling to my knees as the toxin took hold. I was trying to find something to filter and not finding a damned thing. “What the hell is this!?”

He walked towards me, his hands behind his back as if he were strolling through a garden. “Another secret of the Sith, called Shillanis powder. Odorless. Tasteless. Untraceable. Sith alchemists created it long ago, and one of its many properties is that one cannot sense its purpose in the Force.” He made a delighted noise. “We have been using it to kill Jedi for many years, with no one the wiser.”

I tried to speak again and could not. I fell back, sprawling onto the cold floor as the Shillanis took away my ability to move. _Stupid!_ I swore at myself. I hadn't let my guard down and I'd been caught anyway. _You know better than to trust anything he does!_ I stared up at him, all that I could do, and wondered how long it took Shillanis to bring death.

Sidious stopped beside me, chuckling with delight. “I do so enjoy our little conversations, General. There is a wit about you that is sadly lacking in my apprentice. Don't worry,” he said, as if sensing my thoughts. “The Shillanis is not fatal. It merely causes the intense paralysis you are now experiencing. The effects will disperse with the dawn.”

He clapped his hands once. The women appeared again, clearing the table with hurried professionalism before retreating. “Rackthor!” Palpatine called, and a new human I hadn't seen before entered the room. He was pushing a hoversled, and on that hoversled was a cage. Rackthor himself was a withered wreck of a man with bent back, lined and scarred skin, and dead eyes. He bowed to Sidious before leaving the room, as silent as the others had been.

I had a very bad feeling about all of this.

Sidious knelt down and patted my shoulder, as if trying to impart comfort. If I could have moved, I would have bitten him. “You have intrigued me since the day you killed my dear Maul,” he said, the rough tone of his voice more pronounced than usual. “Who was this boy, I wondered, who could best my apprentice, one who had long ago proved himself to be worthy of the title of Sith Lord?” I couldn't quite focus anymore, but if I wasn't mistaken, he was leering at me. I wanted to shudder and could not. “You were beautiful in your grief.”

The next time I decided that things could not possibly get any worse, I was going to have to fight really hard not to laugh myself sick. He ran his hand down my arm, and clucked in mock-sympathy at the old lightsaber scar that ran down my forearm. Despite the paralysis, I could feel his touch without hindrance, and hated it. “You are even more beautiful in your fury,” Sidious whispered, and his hand dropped from my arm to my groin.

I managed a slight whisper of noise, all of the anger I felt concentrated to make one pure, if faint, sound of denial. He chortled at me, then delivered a vicious pinch to my balls that I would have shrieked about if I'd had the voice to do so. He stood up, that damned grin still firmly in place, and took a few steps away. “Not yet, General. I tend to prefer that my prey in that arena is capable of fighting back.”

 _What a coincidence._ I would have bared my teeth if I could have. _I prefer to be able to fight back, too._

“Tonight, however, I have something else in mind. I heard my apprentice's request of you, though you did not answer him. But I am not one to miss an opportunity.” He walked over to the hoversled that Rackthor - if that was his name - had left in the room, running a hand over the cage it carried. “Inside this cage are three sleeping kother hounds, from a favored world of mine. Once they were quite docile, but as I'm sure you've seen from the laboratories here, there are ways of altering behavior, appearance, and biology.” He opened the cage door, revealing the sleeping hounds. They weren't very large, but I could already see hints of sharp teeth and claw. “They haven't been fed in some time,” Palpatine said, as if the thought was just occurring to him. “Kother hounds are known, of course, for turning on their masters if the desire to feed is strong enough.”

At once I realized what he intended to do. I was going to be locked inside this place with three starving Kother hounds, who were going to see me as nothing more as an easily obtainable meal. If I'd had my voice, I would have introduced Palpatine to the greater part of my Huttese vocabulary.

“You will not be able to escape,” he said, and gave me a smile that was sympathetic, unless you looked closer. Then there was only madness. “Perhaps I shall see you in the morning, General. Or perhaps not.” His laughter echoed throughout the room until the door sealed shut behind him.

As if on cue, the hounds awoke, growls rising from the throats of all three. They jumped out of the cage, scenting the air and looking around. I forced myself to remain calm. With Palpatine, it was hard to tell which words were truth and which were fiction, and I didn't have a reason to panic until the Kother hounds gave me one.

The leader of the pack, a black hound slightly bigger than the others, noticed me first. He approached me cautiously, as if expecting a trap. I tried to force a word past my lips, but all I managed was another one of those strangled, pathetic whispers. The hound growled at me, a low rumble, attracting the notice of the others who ambled up to stand with him. I stared the leader in the eyes, trying to put all of my strength into that gaze, warning him that this way lay danger.

For a few moments, it worked, as the hounds obeyed instincts older than their biological tampering. Then hunger drove the smallest of them forward with a sudden leap, and she latched down on my arm in a ferocious grip. Teeth went through my sleeve and into flesh, rending and tearing.

I wanted to scream and couldn't. Instinct, honed and trained for over thirty years, was a lot smarter than I was in that moment. Without thought I shoved the hound away with the Force. I couldn't help but be shocked when the hound yelped in surprise as she slid across the polished floor. The others charged, and I called myself seven different shades of idiot, fending off the attacking hounds. Shillanis did not inhibit the Force. I'd made a dangerous assumption that had almost cost me my life.

I felt sympathy for the starving dogs, but knew I couldn't just keep them at bay all night. I would get tired, and I needed to tend to my bleeding, aching arm somehow. _Sorry,_ I thought at them. _But tonight it's you or me, and it has to be me._ It was the work of a moment more to snap their necks, bringing instant death, and silence descended upon the dining hall.

Even with the Force, I still couldn't find the Shillanis powder in my system. I looked for and could find no reason for my body to no longer respond to my commands. Whatever it was, it was certainly well-designed. I turned my attention back to my arm and realized I'd gone after the wrong problem first.

 _Right. Biologically redesigned,_ I thought, wishing I had some way to vent my frustration, even if it was just with a deep breath. There were traces of dark poison seeping into my body from the Kother's bite, and if I didn't do something about it fast, I was going to learn first-hand what difficulties a Kother bite could cause.

 _Trance down,_ I told myself, and managed to do so despite the fact that I couldn't even close my eyes. The healing trance was sketchy at best, but I was able to redirect my immune system to seek and destroy all traces of the Kother venom. By the time I was done I was exhausted, but at least I was going to live.

Of course, I should have known better to trust Palpatine to keep things simple. The fire-retardant sprinklers in the room turned on, and I was quickly drenched by ice-cold water that poured down from multiple points in the ceiling. I hadn't seen any drains in the room, and wondered if I was soon going to have to add drowning to my list of concerns.

After a few moments passed I realized that I could hear the sound of draining water, so at least the water would never have the chance to get very deep. Then I felt something swim past my hand. _Oh, what now?_ I wondered, right before something bit down on my fingers. My eyes watered as the pain hit, unable to move as I was. I flicked the strange new creature away with the Force. Another of the mysterious creatures bit through my pants and into my leg, and my strangled whisper almost sounded like the pained curse I'd wanted to utter. Higher ground was what I needed now. If I didn't get the hell out of the water, fast, I was going to be nibbled to death by mutant Sith fish.

I managed to levitate myself off of the ground, settling myself onto the dining table, feeling water squeeze out of my tunics as my weight pressed down on the cloth. I was soaked to the bone, and if I wasn't mistaken, someone was lowering the temperature in the room. Already my teeth were beginning to chatter. _You want to play games?_ I snarled the thought. _Then let's play._

I couldn't see the fire repression system above, but I could sense it. I found the pipelines and traced it to the nearest valve, shutting off the one above me and breaking the lever for it. It still rained down water in the rest of the room, but for now the air above me was dry. I eyed the chair nearest me, scooting it away from the table with a gentle touch. The entire lot of them were made of wood, glazed with an ebony finish that looked flammable. My teeth were chattering so hard now that my jaw was starting to ache, and I took a moment to gain my concentration back. I needed focus for what I was about to do, because I'd only managed it once before. I focused back on the chair as best I could, touched it with the Force, and felt a moment of immense satisfaction as it burst into flame. It stank, but the warmth felt wonderful.

 _Let's play, you son of a bitch. But by the time I'm done, you're going to need a new fucking set of chairs._ There was no reply, but I didn't expect one. I wasn't certain, but I had a feeling Palpatine did things like this in his spare time quite often. For fun.

I'd never liked being anyone's plaything.

Nothing else happened in the next few hours, but the temperature kept dropping. I was on my sixth chair, with only two to go, and what parts of myself I hadn't been able to warm with the fire were quickly frosting. If this kept up it was going to start snowing in the dining hall. The thought made me smile.

Then I realized I'd managed an expression, and the smile vanished in surprise. Some of my fine movement had come back. I started testing things and found that I could wiggle most of my fingers, some of my toes, close my eyes - and if I concentrated, I could lift my right arm an inch above the table. Not a great start, but better than I'd hoped for, and earlier than Palpatine's time-table had suggested.

When my chrono marked the hour of dawn, I could move, but the movements were sluggish because I was half-frozen. At that moment the notion of Tatooine sounded like a paradise. I'd run out of chairs, and if it hadn't been for my concern about Palpatine's little biting friends I probably would have dumped myself back in the water and set the table on fire. Now I got down from it, positive the swimmers weren't going to be able to chew through my boots, and sloshed a shaky path through the standing water to the door. It was locked, but that wasn't a surprise, and it wasn't about to stop me from getting the hell out of here. Garen Muln might have had trouble with fine control of the Force, but his bulldozing tactic had its uses. I used the Force to brutalize the door's controls, shoving the resistant thing open when the door tried to jam.

I was met by one of the dour-faced women, who took in my frosted, shivering appearance without so much as a raised eyebrow. The flooded room, sprinklers, and missing chairs, however, gained me at least a curious look. I stared back at her, wondering why she was here. Wondering if it was by choice. “Tell your Master,” I finally said, my voice hoarse, “that he should be on the lookout for a new table.”

She gave me an odd look. “A new table, my Lord?” The odd look became wide-eyed surprise as the black table caught fire, the ebony finish helping to spread the blaze over its entire surface.

“Yes,” I said, giving her a tight smile. “The old one's a bit damaged.” Maybe it was petty of me, but in that moment I didn't care. Burning a table to the ground was sorry damned vengeance, but it made me happy anyway. “And don't call me that.”

 

*          *          *          *

 

All of that day I huddled in my chosen little room with the thermostat cranked up as I tried to burn the aftereffects of exposure out of my system. The last thing I wanted to do was wind up needing a healer in this place. Force knew what kind of help Palpatine would provide if the situation arose. I sure as hell didn't want any of his pet biologists having a crack at me. The wound on my arm I healed as much as I could, laying a bacta patch I found in my belt pouch over the worst of the damage. With luck it would finish healing as I slept.

There was a tiny 'fresher in a room just next to my bolt-hole. No shower, but it had a sink that provided hot water, and I cleaned up as best I could. A shower would have been great, but I hadn't seen one in all of my explorations. But then again, given the foul odors that some of the people I'd encountered emanated, maybe they didn't notice the lack.

No one bothered me that day. I never sensed Palpatine or any of his miscreants nearby. I went to sleep that night and fell into a series of nightmares that left me with plenty of fear and little rest.

The fifth day I ventured out again, hiding my still-shaking hands inside the pockets of my robe. My lightsaber was in my pocket with my right hand. I wasn't in the mood to be civil to anyone, let alone a house full of corrupt beings.

I raided the kitchen, once again finding only droids who ignored my existence, even if I took things from their hands as they worked. Their refusal to react bothered me. It was hard to find a droid that hadn't developed some kind of attitude in response to dwelling and dealing with other sentients. It was usually part of their programming.

My raging hunger dealt with, I paused and glanced inside the dining hall, not surprised to find it empty. No trace of my night spent inside remained.

My steps led me back to Palpatine's library, straight to the holocron that housed Darth Malek. I fumbled with it before activating it, setting the holocron down on the dais as Malek's holographic form materialized. It must have had recognition software, because when he saw me he spoke Basic instead of whatever language he'd used the first time. “Greetings, Jedi. Do you seek the knowledge of the Sith?” he asked, and I could have sworn the damned program was grinning at me.

The muscles of my stomach knotted up. More and more I was questioning my decision to stay here, but I didn't yet see another option. I thought of Anakin, stuck in that blasted armor, and plowed ahead. “Not by choice. What is Shillanis powder?”

“Ahh. A secret of the Sith. It is based off of plants from the Sith homeworld. The plants themselves are long extinct, but Shillanis can be recreated in any well-prepared laboratory. I presume Lord Sidious introduced you to it.”

“Yes.”

Malek's hologram gave me a considering look. “As you seem to be quite undamaged, I imagine you discovered that it does not affect your control of the Force before things became…interesting.”

I scowled at Malek. “You're very funny. I -- wait.” I stared at the hologram. “I know that holocrons are interactive, but you speak of Sidious with a lot of familiarity.”

Malek smiled, the expression laced with dark humor. “Not all holocrons are created equal, Jedi. Your kind imprint yourselves to holocrons, that is true. However, only the Sith give our holocrons part of our life-force. I am not merely a program. I am very much a living embodiment of Darth Malek.”

I gazed at Darth Malek in quiet shock. If he had done what I thought he had done, the Sith had achieved a sort of immortality - at least until someone destroyed the holocron. “That must be a handy trick,” I said at last.

“Indeed. But you asked of Shillanis powder. What do you wish to know, Jedi?”

“Sidious has declared it to be untraceable. Is there a way to discover its presence? No offense to your little brotherhood of the Sith, but I'd like to avoid it from now on.”

“A wise man knows the tactics of his enemies,” Malek quoted.

“That's a Jedi saying,” I said, scowling.

“The Sith and the Jedi are flip sides of the same coin, Jedi. Yes, there is a way to discover the presence of Shillanis - but you must view its presence through the Dark side of the Force.”

I glared at him, not believing him for a moment. “There has to be another way. The Force is in all things, even your Shillanis.”

Malek looked at me with a grimace that spoke of impatience. “No. Shillanis was designed to be what it is, not what you wish it to be. Only when anger guides your heart will you be able to find Shillanis where it may be hidden.” He peered at me, a nasty smile appearing on his face. “Shillanis can also be absorbed through the skin.”

 _No._  I stepped back, holding up my hands to look at them. A fine layer of powder dusted my fingertips from where I had handled the holocron. “Dammit!” I brushed my hands off on my robe, even though my arms were already gaining that now-familiar cold, deadening weight.

Malek laughed. “Jedi are such delightful things. Wouldn't you agree, Lord Sidious?”

I managed to turn enough to face him, realizing that I had a few moments longer with skin contact than ingestion before I fell prey to their poison. “Bastard,” I said, the floor tilting alarmingly as something went wrong with my equilibrium. I stumbled, catching myself but unable to keep the floor where it belonged. It kept tilting at horrible angles, and I held one hand out in a vain effort to keep my balance.

Palpatine chuckled in amusement, looking at me as one looks at a disobedient child. “This one in particular, Lord Malek, is indeed a delightful example. It is going to be so much fun to break him.”

“Fuck you,” I gasped out, falling to my knees and closing my eyes against welling nausea.

“I should warn you that repeated exposure to Shillanis can cause an overdose,” Malek's voice said, and he sounded far too happy. “Dizziness, nausea, equilibrium troubles…”

I fell forward, my right arm trapped underneath me, my breath almost halted in my chest as the paralysis took hold. I struggled to breathe, fighting unresponsive muscles and an unyielding floor. My body, starved for oxygen, began to scream for it, and dark spots danced across my vision. “Oh yes. Definitely an overdose. Lord Sidious, you should find your task much easier this time.”

I turned my attention back to the holocron, sharp, vivid anger giving me focus. “Shut up,” I ground out, reaching out with an invisible fist and smashing Malek's holocron with the Force. There was a horrible squeal of ancient, tortured mechanics and an angry roar from Malek before both noises were cut off when I hit it again.

The spots grew, and I knew I was fading from lack of oxygen. Palpatine's angry snarl followed me down into darkness.

When I woke up, I actually had to fight a mad urge to laugh. I was strung up in the center of a dank, dark room. Binders suspended from the ceiling held my wrists above my head, pulling me upright, and binders attached to my feet kept me from being able to move more than an inch or two in any direction. I'd been stripped of my tunics, my belt, my boots. The entire setup reminded me of a bad holovid.

Most of the paralysis was gone, I discovered, but the room was spinning and tilting as I looked around. My lungs felt cramped, telling me I had probably been in this position for a long time. I shuddered, not wanting to think about what might have happened to me while I was unconscious.

“Ah. You're awake.”

I jerked away from the sound of Palpatine's voice, gritting my teeth when the movement timed itself with another dizzy spell. The last thing I wanted to do at this point was throw up. That would just add such a _wonderful_ layer of misery.

Palpatine circled me slowly, and I couldn't stop a flinch when his hand touched the faint lightsaber scar that ran from my collarbone to my navel. “Stop that,” I demanded.

Sidious ignored me. “Grievous gave that to you during your first encounter with him. Durge, also, was stayed by my hand. If it hadn't been for my order, he would have killed you. You should be thankful.”

Well, that explained why Durge hadn't killed me - he'd damned near succeeded. too. I'd always wondered why he never finished the job. “We thought at the time it was Dooku's order. Never found out exactly why.”

Palpatine smiled. “You could have asked him.”

I tilted my head in an abbreviated shrug, all the motion my bound position would allow me. “Wasn't interested in his answer.” The floor tilted again. I swallowed against another wave of nausea and wondered how long those damned side effects lasted. I couldn't focus worth a damn, and it was like the Force kept dancing just out of reach...

Palpatine's hand drifted lower, and I lost what little control over my temper I'd regained. “Stop. Touching. Me!”

Palpatine laughed, sounding much as he had while still Chancellor. True delight, even though it was slathered in darkness. “Does it bother you so much? I thought Jedi prepared for every eventuality.”

I glared at him. “Prepared? Yes. Does that mean I'm going to just stand here and let you? Not a chance.”

“I wonder if it has anything to do with what happened when you were fourteen,” he said, clasping his hands together as he looked at me with genuine curiosity.

I raised an eyebrow. “A lot happened to me when I was fourteen. You'll have to be more specific.” Considering what kind of hell that year was, he could have been referring to anything.

“You were raped, were you not? Right here on Coruscant.”

I narrowed my eyes. I hadn't expected him to dredge up _that._

“I'm not even going to ask how you know about that,” I muttered. There wasn't much point to denying it. “That was a long time ago, it was horrible, and thank you so verymuch for reminding me of it.”

“I read your file.” He grinned when I muttered a curse under my breath. I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised that Dooku gave him full access. Why just delete a planet, when you had the entirety of the Jedi Archives and all personnel files at your fingertips? “The Jedi Healers were quite pleased with your recovery, both physical and mental, though they noted a resistance when it came to telling your Master what had happened.” He paused, that grin widening when I refused to be baited. “You never did tell him, did you? A lingering shame, perhaps? A feeling of failure?”

I drew in a deep breath, let it out, and looked at him. “Nothing you've mentioned had anything to do with why I never told him.” The memory wasn't all that pleasant, but Tahl had kept her word - she had never told Qui-Gon what happened, either. Even after the worst of it had faded, and Qui-Gon had returned from the mission to Devoria that he'd had to undertake alone, I said nothing. We'd had a hard enough time working on our bond, and I'd sensed that my Master would see a failing in himself for not being there to prevent what happened to me. I had been trying to heal the damage in him, not make it worse, and I'd had no desire to break the fragile peace we'd managed to create together. Later…well, there just hadn't seemed to be any great point to bring it up. _Would you like some tea? Oh, and I have this really bizarre story to tell you…_

Sidious was still gazing at me. “Tell yourself what you like. I imagine it still crops up at odd moments, that time. You tend to be nervous and talkative when you first spend time in someone's bed. That tendency of yours to be more sarcastic... the more on-edge you are.” He accompanied that last sentence by yanking my chin down, forcing me to stare into his eyes. His breath was fetid, rank. The rest of him didn't smell much better.

“That's not in my file,” I replied, trying to lean as far back as I could, but his grip was firm.

“Some things can be learned through simple observation,” Palpatine said, his eyes boring into mine. “Would you like to know what else I have observed about you?”

“I very much doubt that you are a licensed therapist,” I said, and without thought I drove my head down, slamming my skull against his forehead.

Sidious cursed me and stumbled back, putting his hand to his head. I was happy to see blood seeping through his fingers. He looked up, yellow eyes flashing with anger, and I howled in surprise and pain as claws raked through my mind. “Stay out of my head!” I screamed, shoving him away from me with the Force.

Sidious slid halfway across the room before regaining his feet, smiling that oozing politician's smile again. “Good, good! Your anger makes you powerful!”

I gasped, trying to catch my breath, my heart hammering in my chest. I wasn't sure if I was relieved or stunned by what I had done. “The Force makes me powerful,” I countered, snapping the binders on my wrists and dropping on my knees to the floor. Another thought and the binders on my feet snapped. “And I'm leaving now. Whether you like it or not.” The Shillanis aftereffects were still with me, and the floor kept tilting, but anger was giving me the focus to overcome it, purging the remains of it from my system. Malek had been right, damn him.

Sidious stood up, and the light in the room changed, began to diminish. There were hints of electricity gathering at his fingertips. “And what if I don't think we're done speaking, Jedi? You destroyed the holocron of Darth Malek, and his wisdom is now forever lost.”

“Did I?” I felt a reckless grin spread on my face. “Isn't that lovely.”

Palpatine regarded me with a cold stare, and I stared back. What he did next surprised me. “Would you like to know of my introduction to the ways of the Sith?”

I opened my mouth to say no, and further surprised myself by saying yes. My own curiosity astonished me, certain as I was that I didn't care.

The lightning faded back. “When I was a child, I was given to my Master as a gift. He had sensed my potential, you see, and convinced my family that with him, I would have a glorious future. He brought me to his home, and taught me the basic mechanics of using the Force.” His voice lowered. “When I could defend myself to his satisfaction, he dosed me with Shillanis and locked me in an abandoned psychiatric hospital. The problem with its abandonment, however, was that the patients had been left to rot there. Most of them had already gone mad. When they discovered my presence, I learned in no uncertain terms that the galaxy was a dark place indeed.” I listened to him speak, fascinated and horrified. “I could defend myself against one of them, five of them, ten of them. But thirty?” he shook his head, smiling, and I realized in revulsion that he viewed the memory of being brutalized so horribly with _fondness._ “What I had learned was not enough. I suffered, and my anger grew. Soon I was not afraid to use it, and I started to kill them.”

He looked at me, madness in his eyes and blood trickling down his face from the gash in his forehead, and I shivered. “When the last remaining inmate was no more, only then did my Master, Darth Plagueis, come to retrieve me.”

“He was a monster,” I said, sickened.

Sidious didn't agree. “From your own misguided point of view, perhaps. But my Master knew how to create greatness from nothing. He excelled at it. From him I learned how to bend others to my will.” He spoke again, and this time I sensed he was using the words of another. “Tell me your greatest strength, and I will use it against you. Tell me of your greatest fear, so I will know what I must force you to face. Tell me what you cherish most, so I will know what to take from you. Tell me what you crave, so that I might deny you.”

I couldn't help it. I laughed. “Then according to your own teachings, there is nothing that you can do to me. You saw to that, yourself.”

Sidious smiled. “I already have the tools to break you, General. I need only time.” Before I could respond to that, he clapped his hands, calling for Rackthor again. I turned as the elder human entered. “Escort General Kenobi to his new quarters. That drab box he's been sleeping in is not appropriate for my guest.”

“Yes, Lord Sidious,” Rackthor spoke, his voice a dull ruin that might have once been a pleasant baritone.

I looked at Palpatine, off-put by his story and this sudden gesture of hospitality. “Why?” was the only question I could think to ask.

He smiled again. “I told you, General - I am quite fond of your company.”

I willingly followed Rackthor out of the room, away from Palpatine. I couldn't think of anything more frightening ever having been said to me.

Rackthor walked through silent corridors and up two flights of stairs, back to the main floor, with me trailing behind. My attempts to question him, to get him to talk to me - all were met with failure. I caught a glimpse of his eyes, though, and part of me quailed at the broken desolation I found there.

He stopped at last in front of a door, entering a code into the keypad to open it. “You stay here now,” he said, speaking at last. “The code is five two zero four. If you lose the code, it's on your head. Door will lock on the inside. Your lightsaber is on the table by the bed.”

I repressed a laugh. I knew any locks were useless against Sidious. I glanced inside, not surprised that black was the dominant color yet again. “Thank you,” I said, when I saw that my lightsaber was indeed where he said it would be.

Rackthor hesitated, and for a moment there was a spark in those dead amber eyes. “You should leave, Jedi. This is no place for you.”

I looked back at him, feeling a bit of desolation, myself. “I don't think I can.”

“Then pray to your Force that he kills you, Jedi.” Rackthor gave me an empty smile. “You don't want to end up like me.” With that he turned and walked away, leaving me to stare after his retreating form.

Seized by a near-frantic desire to have my lightsaber back in my hands again, I stepped into the room and sealed the door behind me. I took a moment to investigate the weapon to make sure Sidious hadn't corrupted it in some way. Then I started looking for the rest of my things, and in short order I found my belt, boots, and knives. My cloak and tunics, however, were definitely not in residence.

On the bed was a tunic, a pair of pants, and a cloak, all in black. I touched the tunic, knowing that the clothes I'd worn here were probably long gone. _Damn you,_ I thought at Palpatine, not caring if he heard me or not. I knew what game he was playing, and I felt a great surge of annoyance at the pettiness of it all.

The room was empty except for the bed and table. There were two doors opposite the one I came in. One led into an empty closet. The other... I opened that door and sent up a silent prayer to the Force. A full 'fresher with a shower. A water-based shower. That, at least, I would be thankful for.

I realized after I'd showered off days of sweat, dirt, blood, and dust, that my clothes weren't the only thing missing. My chrono was gone, too. In fact, I hadn't seen a timepiece anywhere in the entire building. I could only wonder at the lack. Did Palpatine have some obscure fear of seeing the passage of time? He was at least eighty years old, and given what he was doing to his body, the Sith Lord had to recognize that the odds of holding onto his Empire for long were stacked against him. I didn't think he'd take every time-telling device out of his home just for my benefit, but I couldn't shake the feeling that he had done just that. I had become too damned familiar with methods of torture during the war, and removing the subject's sense of time was just one of the many ways to throw someone off-balance.

I dressed, then glanced at my reflection in the 'fresher's mirror, shaking my head. If it was color I feared, I didn't need to. I didn't look like a Sith – I was just a lost, angry Jedi.

I ran my fingertips through the moisture that had collected on the mirror's surface, smearing my image. If I wanted to stay a Jedi, I needed to find a sense of balance before the scale tipped too far. I hadn't meditated in days. That was a good place to start.

One thing I discovered in my meditations was that my mental shields, while still holding, were a mess. Those claws I'd felt had done more damage than I had realized. I took a moment to fix the walls, sitting on the fear that wanted to well up in my chest. With one swipe he'd nearly taken my entire system down. I couldn't afford to let that happen again.

I contemplated the problem, thinking of Kashyyyk as I did so. Layers upon layers of great forests. Each level was home to different creatures, different types of plants. All of them offered a unique challenge to the Wookiees who called the planet home. Keeping that thought in mind, I started building layers of mental walls, level upon level. At the lowest point, in the core of my consciousness, I hid the things that Palpatine must never find: the identities and locations of Padmé and Anakin's children, my family name, and anything else that would give the Sith the means to finding them.

There were other things, such as the names of the founders of the Alliance who were still alive. I dumped some of the names of those that had already been discovered into the upper layers I'd created. They were already dead, so there was little harm in their names being revealed. In each layer, I dumped further packets of information, cataloging my life in insane detail. I sensed that what I was doing would go a long way to securing my thoughts, but I couldn't hide everything. If Palpatine managed to break through my first layer of shielding, what he would find below would make him think, for a time, that he had access to all that I was. He was going to have to do a hell of a lot of digging to find anything of substance, and he would have to fight me the entire way.

 _Knowledge and defense - these things are the path of the Jedi. Know your enemy._ I breathed out that thought, opening my eyes. Meditation was usually refreshing, but I'd done a lot more work than I'd expected. I was bone-weary. I stood up, pulling the bedding off of the bed, checking for Force knew what at this point. I saw nothing, sensed nothing, but I trusted nothing. Not anymore. My own senses had already been fooled multiple times. I couldn't afford for that to happen again.

At last I searched the new cloak for hidden dangers, and after finding nothing, I curled up in it, settling between bed and the wall. I needed to sleep. I had a plan, of sorts, and I wanted to put it in motion before Palpatine had the chance to inflict more chaos. I flicked off the lights with the Force, leaned my head against the wall, and tried to remember what peace had felt like.

 

*          *          *          *

 

Learning the Sith language, I reflected, was like trying to skull-fuck yourself with a starship engine. The alphabet itself hadn't been so bad. I could tell that once it had been a relatively normal language, as the Sith species had evolved over time on Korriban. It was what came later, when they swallowed Darkness whole and laced it in everything they did, that corrupted it. The Sith race had been extinct for several millennia, and those that followed the path they created had further warped the language, twisting it until it was foul to behold and worse to listen to.

Grasping grammar, sentence structure, words, phrases - that had been harder, because I was looking at texts of various ages. Even if I thought I was limited to one thousand years of time (and I was no longer certain of that), the ways of speaking changed in language every so often. Still, within three days I was reading, straining my mind to translate foreign ideas and dark concepts.

I shut the book I was looking at, sneezing at the dust that rose up, and was tempted to bang my head against the table a few dozen times. Immersion was the fastest way to learn a language, which was also the fastest path to finding out more about what I was dealing with. I just wished the Sith had lighter material. There was so much destruction, death, and mayhem in one journal entry that it boggled the mind. I didn't know who Darth Valath had been, but in his own journal he was wordy, violent, and had the temperament of a two year-old child that had been denied candy.

I glanced at the two remaining holocrons, and pushed back the headache I'd created from force-feeding myself a language of vitriol. Reading was one thing. Now I needed to know if I could understand the spoken form. I touched the second, smaller one, activating it with the barest touch on the correct sigils.

It was a human woman who appeared, with fiery red hair and smoldering rage in her eyes. She saw me, and her lips curled in a mocking smile. “Saghatha huth na, Jedi,” she said.

Of course she recognized me. For all I knew, Sidious cuddled his holocrons in his arms at night and had them tell him bedtime stories. “Fefniath Sith, eshute,” I said, inclining my head.

Even Sith, it seems, could be surprised. She continued speaking in the Sith tongue, her eyes lit with manic delight. “You learn quickly, Master Kenobi. Tell me: why does a professed Jedi learn the speech of the Sith?” she said.

“Because I wish to stay alive,” I replied. “I'm sure of all things, you at least understand that.”

“Yes…that is one thing we share in common, Jedi.” She executed an elaborate, archaic bow. “I am Darth Zannah. My Master was Darth Bane.”

The founders of the Rule of Two. I stared at the holographic image of the woman before me, who had been born one thousand years ago into unceasing war between the Jedi and the Sith. For a long moment I said nothing. The tactician in me was whispering, tying events together, following the hints that I'd stumbled across since my arrival. “How old is the Prophecy of the Chosen One?” I found myself asking.

This time I got a grin out of the ancient Sith. “Learns quickly, and is intelligent. You will make a wonderful addition to our ranks, Jedi.”

“Fuck you,” I said, with a pleasant smile on my face. “How old?”

If she was offended by my dismissal of her flattery, she didn't show it. “My Master wrote the Prophecy when I reached my twentieth year, secreting it in the library on Morous IV. But you already knew that,” she said, looking up at me with a predatory gleam. “Handsome, too. If I were still alive, you would be in my bed by now, Jedi. I always did prefer the smart ones.”

I shook my head, ignoring her. A Sith prophecy, not a Jedi one. How they must have laughed over the centuries, waiting patiently for that vision to come true. “Fooling us into believing it was three thousand years older than its actual writing must have amused you to no end,” I muttered.

“Darth Sidious and Darth Vader are the result of long centuries of cunning, planning, and patience. We all rejoice in the fact that our revenge comes at last,” she said, but for a moment I could have sworn I saw a touch of bitterness in her eyes. Then she pointed towards a row of books I had not yet looked at. “I like you, so I will make your life more interesting. In those books you will find the words of Darth Plagueis the Wise. Read carefully, and read well. In his words you may find what you are looking for.”

“What makes you think I'm looking for something?” I said, disconcerted.

She smiled back before her image began to fade, the holocron shutting down of its own accord. “You seek vengeance, Jedi,” she said, and I heard her faint laughter before the holocron's energy matrix closed.

 

*          *          *          *

 

I was losing all track of time. Long hours hiding in Sidious's library, combined with the utter misery of this place, were playing havoc with my senses. I gritted my teeth and withstood it, meditating until I could think clearly. Then I would go back to reading Plagueis's words, and had to start the cycle all over again.

I was skipping meals without much realization of it, but I'd felt little need for food. Really, being forced to spend time in Palpatine's company each evening over dinner was enough to put me off my appetite for good. He tried to dose me with the Shillanis three more times. Each time I noticed what had been spiked and shoved it aside without comment, to be collected by his silent serving staff. I knew he was pleased by that, which just angered me even further.

Other than that, I did not see Palpatine, and I was bloody happy with that. It gave me the time to read through all of Plagueis's books. The Muun had been an eloquent writer, a nice change from Valath's idiocy. Sidious's master made up for his eloquence by introducing me to some of the most horrifying concepts I'd ever come across. When I had read the last entry, I looked up at the ceiling of the library, in shock and not caring who noticed. The madness the Sith had indulged in!

I had never met Anakin's mother, but the description of the dark-haired slave in Plagueis's books reminded me of the tales my Padawan had once told me of his mother. I did not want to think about what the Sith Lord claimed to have done.

I returned the book to its place on the dusty shelf and went to find Vader.

The hermetic seal cracked, and the top half of the sphere rose into the air. I was leaning against the opening when Vader's form appeared as light came up. “Knock, knock,” I said, my tone sardonic and entirely too cheerful.

“What is it?” he asked, anger audible in the way he clipped his words.

“We need to talk,” I said, my voice turning hard. “Now.”

Darth Vader regarded me for a long moment. I had the feeling he was getting used to intimidating people with silence. He could keep trying all he liked. I wasn't in the mood to be intimidated by a mask and harsh breathing. “Very well,” he said, rising and stepping forward.

I stepped back, watching with a critical eye as he eased himself from the hermetic sphere. He had trouble flexing in certain places. “I'll bet you can't spar in any form but the Second, now,” I said.

Vader rose to his full height. “No. I cannot. Do you find that amusing, Obi-Wan?”

“No,” I said, most of my ire bleeding away. I had once had to train my ass off to keep up with my brilliant Padawan, learning every form and variation, and now all of that talent was ash. “I find it sad.”

“I do not need your pity,” he said, spinning away from me and striding down the hall.

“Good,” I retorted, increasing my pace to keep up with him. “Because I find myself lacking it.”

He led me to an empty room on the second level with a table in the center of it. He stopped on one side while I stood at the other, and we stared at each other for a full minute. It was Vader who broke the silence. “You wanted to speak to me. Talk. I am running out of patience.”

I wanted to point out that patience was never his strong point, but did not. Instead I placed the book I had been carrying on the table. “Palpatine has said that he told you a tale of Darth Plagueis the Wise. He said that Plagueis held power to save the dying, to bring the dead back to life.”

Vader nodded. “He said this, yes. He also has said that Plagueis told him how to do this, and that he could do it for me.”

I grinned at that, though there was not much humor in it. “He was lying about the last part, but that doesn't matter. Either way...” my grin died. “Don't let him.”

If he had expected anything from me, it certainly wasn't that. “You know of my feelings in this matter, Obi-Wan. Why should I deny myself this?” I could sense his anger. “I realized after a time that I had been foolish to accuse you of trying to attain my wife's affections for yourself. Was I wrong to change my mind?”

I rolled my eyes. That was about as much of an apology as I was going to get for that bit of ridiculousness. “I am not asking for you, or for me. I'm asking for her sake.” I walked down the length of the table, feeling Vader's eyes upon me. “I've read Plagueis's journals. I have to admit, the man was brilliant. Dark and twisted, but brilliant. He had some interesting ideas about the influence of the Force over midichlorians, and using that influence to create or extend life. If he is to be believed, he was over two hundred years old. Not bad for a Muun, who tend to have much shorter lifespans.”

“What does that have to do with Padmé?” Vader asked, and I could feel him glowering at me.

“I'm getting to that!” I snapped, shaking my head. I was short on patience myself, it seemed. “Of what you want, Anakin, there are two ways to go about it. Both of them involved cloning. Do I have your attention yet?”

“I had considered that possibility, yes,” he said, and I knew he was listening now.

“On one hand, you would have a clone of your wife. No alterations beyond that, if you could find the Kaminoans and convince them to give you what you want. But you and I have both worked with enough Mandalorian clones to know that none of them were Jango Fett, despite sharing his DNA.” Vader inclined his head at that, acknowledging the truth of my words. “The second option...” I paused. This had horrified me when I read it, and I was no less appalled now. “Plagueis maintained that he could pull the essence of someone back from the Force, back from death. That he could capture this essence in an empty vessel, a blank holocron, or even another living sentient's mind.”

“Then it's true,” Vader said, and I could sense his excitement.

“True, yes,” I said, glaring at him. “That doesn't make it right. Would you want that for her, Anakin?”

“I would pay any price to have her with me again,” he intoned.

“Dammit, you are not _listening_ to me!” I shouted, slamming my fists down onto the table. Vader actually stepped back, surprised by my outburst. “Anakin, do you love your wife?”

“You know that I do,” he replied, his hands clenched into fists.

“She's at peace, you daft bastard,” I told him, furious at myself and at him, and at Palpatine and the galaxy in general. “Would you rip her from that peace, just to have her with you again? Would you have her resent you for all time? Would you trap her here, in some form or some body that wasn't hers, imprison her, just to have her again?”

He was silent at that, looking at me with eyes hidden forever behind an expressionless mask.

“You know what Padmé would think about this. You know how she would feel. You had already broken her heart, Anakin,” I said quietly. “Would you break her spirit, too? Would you destroy everything about her that you loved?”

He sank to his knees, his head bowed, and despite it all, my heart ached at the sight. One more hope dashed. One more reason to dwell in darkness. For all that I wanted to reach Anakin, to break the thrall the Sith had over him, all I had succeeded in doing was driving him further into shadow. I began to leave. At least I knew that he would never allow Palpatine to attempt Plagueis's dark magic. Padmé would be untouched by this.

“Wait.”

I turned back, curious, to find Vader had risen, his black-gloved hand touching the bound volume I had left on the table. “The things of which you speak... are they in here?”

“There are a great many things in there, and I don't like any of them,” I said.

The respirator breathed for him several more times as Vader contemplated the book. I stared at Vader, wondering what he was thinking. Wondering who I was really dealing with. “You were always... good with languages,” he said at last. “I learned a great many things from you.” Vader lifted his head to look at me. “Teach me this. If you wish to help me, Master, then help me now.”

I hesitated, torn. If I helped him learn the language, there was nothing to stop him from learning every twisted thing the Sith could offer him. He would become even more of a monster than he already was. Yet, if I helped him, he would also be able to withstand more of Palpatine's manipulation. The more knowledge he had, the safer he was.

I stepped forward, my expression grim. “All right. I'll teach you how to read it.”

I always fucking hated a paradox.

 

*          *          *          *

 

Time was gone. I waved goodbye to it sometime around the second week. Or at least, I thought it was the second week. See? Bye-bye, time. I shook my head at myself, realizing I'd gone loopy and not sure what to do about it.

I'd lost enough weight that the new clothes I'd been given were loose on my frame. There was nothing flattering about a man wearing tunics that didn't fit. More showed up in my closet one day, despite the locked door. (I knew it was useless.) Everything was black. I was starting to hate black.

I was hallucinating on top of everything else. Little black specks here and there, nothing major at first. After a while, though, I was less worried about black specks and more worried about the fact that I kept catching myself trying to plant a lightsaber in something that didn't exist. It was stupid - now that I could sense Vader and Palpatine, no longer leaping when they made their appearance from deep shadow, I was instead jumping _at_ shadows. The only nice thing I got out of it was knowing how much it would cost Palpatine to get his glossy stone walls repaired.

I wasn't getting much sleep, and my meditations were harried, horrible affairs that would have shamed my teaching masters. I'd been more well-rested sleeping in a muddy trench while cluster bombs went off overhead. The Force... the Force was still there, as it always was. Unchanging. I just wasn't in any shape to listen. I was in desperate, dire trouble.

I hung on, grim-faced, taking temporary solace in the fact that if I wasn't breaking Anakin out of Darkness, then at least he was spending time in my presence. Though it was Vader most of the time, if I were to be honest with myself. Occasionally, hints of Anakin would break through, my dear lost Padawan's sense of the absurd forced to rise up from shattered depths as he dealt with learning the Sith tongue.

I had secured Padmé's peace, but Anakin... Anakin I was losing, and I knew it. I watched him pore over dusty Sith tomes when he wasn't out playing Death to rabble-rousers and fleeing Jedi, and sensed the Darkness creeping forward, covering all.

I found myself almost desperate to ask him who he had killed today, or yesterday, or in the last year. Part of me wanted to know. The part of me that was still thinking told me in no uncertain terms that it would be a bad idea. I hadn't come here to kill Anakin again, and if I heard the name of one more friend, I might try.

I had finished teaching him the language, and sharp regret warred with crystalline purpose. Every day I saw fewer signs of Anakin's presence. I searched for my brother, watching him as I made him read one of the tomes of Darth Plagueis. I would never willingly hand him the last one, the one that I was certain held the secrets of his strange birth. If Anakin sought it out on his own one day, so be it, but I wasn't going to hand Anakin Skywalker one more reason to believe that he was meant to dwell in Darkness.

In one clear, razor-sharp moment, I knew the path of redemption for Anakin lay beyond my reach. The damage to his mind was healing, but it would be years before Darkness was less a poison and more of a choice. By then, he would either be dead, or ... or... I hesitated, appalled by the very thought.

The path to redemption or destruction for Vader lay in his children - the only two beings left alive who he would perceive as having never betrayed him.

I buried the notion so deep that it would take the destruction of my own mind for anyone else to find it. “Aghtha tavothm, naga?” I asked, trying to keep myself distracted from the fact that my heart was pounding in my chest. _Are you finished, then?_

“I can read it. I do not think I will ever gain the ability to speak it.” Vader shut the book, resting his gloved hands on either side of the journal. I wanted to fidget in place. I now knew that I had to get the hell out of here, somehow. Yet still I hesitated. Darkness would be Anakin's companion for a long time to come, but did he need to stay here? Could I convince him to at least escape Palpatine's grasp?

I didn't know. I couldn't go until I was certain. I cursed myself for a fool even as I made that decision. “Perhaps in time. Encased in that suit as you are, time is now your ally.”

“Perhaps,” Darth Vader said. “I…” he paused, and for a moment his shields slipped enough that I _could_ sense Anakin, somewhere in those black depths. “Thank you for doing this. But do not think that I don't understand what you're trying to do.”

“And what would I be trying to do?” I asked, curious as to what he had determined my goal was.

“Knowledge is the way of the Jedi. Do you think if I gain enough knowledge, I will change my mind?” Vader asked, his words cold enough that he could have dragged the temperature of the room down with them.

“I don't know,” I snapped, annoyed. “I've been trying to beat knowledge into your brain for almost fifteen years now. I don't see how you could think I'm up to some devious scheme when it hasn't worked _yet._ ”

Vader was quiet for a moment, while I tried to rein in my frayed temper. “Perhaps it will work, eventually,” Vader said, his tone mild.

For a moment I stared at him, a gossamer thread of hope in my heart. That was Anakin speaking, shoving Vader's cold rage to the side. In those moments that I felt my Padawan, I could sense this great struggle, as if Darkness was a body of water that he was slowly drowning in. _Come on, Anakin,_ I chanted in my head. _Fight it. Wake up. Give me reason to hope that it will not be years before your mind is your own again._

“Isn't this…charming,” Palpatine said, his voice oozing into the room on an oily cloud.

There was a growl in my throat as I turned to see the Emperor, cloaked as always, though now he bore a cane in one hand. It was ebony, carved in a spiral from top to bottom, and I didn't like the look of it one bit. Its purpose was innocuous, but it had been drowned in Darkness, like everything else Palpatine touched.

Which meant that I was drowning in Darkness, too. Not a comforting thought.

“Master,” Darth Vader said, standing to bow low to his chosen Master. The moment was definitely broken. Anakin was gone as if he had never been.

“You have such delightful timing,” I said, picking up the book. I had an insane urge to throw it at him. It was always like this. I would make some sort of inroads, sense Anakin's struggle, and then Palpatine would show up like an unwanted parasite.

Palpatine spied the book, his lips curling in a devious smile. “Ah, the words of my Master. Excellent choice, General. I should thank you for giving my apprentice this lesson.”

“But you will not, as it is one that you would never have given him yourself,” I replied, smiling, pretending a cheerfulness I did not feel.

Palpatine neither confirmed nor denied this. “Leave us,” he instructed me. “I have words for my student.”

Some part of me uncurled from its comfortable hiding place, taking notice. Palpatine had never spoken like that to me before, and I definitely did not have a taste for it. “No.”

The Sith Lord hadn't expected that. “No?” he repeated, giving me an innocuous look that didn't fool me one bit. There was anger in those yellow, baleful eyes.

“I don't take orders from you,” I said, straightening from where I had been leaning against the table Vader and I had used for reading.

He smiled, a dripping bit of false flattery. “But once you obeyed the orders of the Chancellor, Obi-Wan. Will you not abide an order from me now?”

I felt a feral smile grow on my face. “Well, now you're an Emperor and I'm an outlaw. Therefore, no.”

Vader stood there, watching our little parlay without moving. His stillness bothered me, but I couldn't dwell on that. I most certainly had Palpatine's attention now.

He was gazing at me, thoughts and intent hidden behind shields I couldn't hope to penetrate. “Are you challenging me?” he asked, his voice soft.

I rolled my eyes. “Unbelievable. In case you haven't noticed, I've been doing that since I arrived here. As you have yet to do anything about it, I suppose I'll just have to keep being obnoxious.”

I don't know what I expected. I saw him lift the cane he held, gesturing with it.

The air left my lungs in a surprise rush as an invisible hand crushed my chest, flinging me backwards into the wall. I gasped, trying to get my air back and get my feet under me without falling. For a moment black spots danced across my vision, and I forced them away. My chest ached, both from the force-push and from the impact on the wall.

Palpatine hadn't moved, and was resting both of his hands on his ebony cane again. His voice was growing dark, dangerous. “I will say it again. Leave.”

I shook my head to clear it and then bared my teeth at him. “No.”

The cane didn't move, but the invisible fist slammed me back into the wall again. The back of my head bounced off of unyielding stone and duracrete, and the black spots danced merrily in front of my eyes once more. This time I couldn't will them away. “Ow,” I said, reaching up to touch the back of my head. My fingers came away red-tipped with fresh blood.

Palpatine chuckled. “It is your choice, General. Either you can leave on your own, or I will eventually have you carried out.”

This was insane. This was the wrong time to infuriate the Sith, and yet I couldn't help myself. “I have a thick skull, or so I've been told,” I said, raising my head and staring directly into Sidious's eyes.

He clucked at me as if I were a silly, misbehaving child. “My friend, this is pointless. What lesson could you hope to pass on to your former student, acting in this manner?”

I gave him a crooked grin, feeling warm blood trickle down from the gash in my scalp. “Defiance.”

His smile disappeared. “Very well,” he said, and lifted the cane once more

 

*          *          *          *

 

Healing trances were becoming the norm rather than the exception, but they were getting harder and harder to maintain. I didn't know what to make of that. Was it because of Sidious, or the inherit Darkness of this place - or was something going intrinsically wrong with me?

I uttered a short laugh, opening my eyes as I came out of the trance, and realized that Vader was in the room as well, waiting. I heard that damned respirator before I sensed him, as he was doing an admirable job of hiding his presence. No; that wasn't it. He was just hiding his presence from everyone else. That made me curious - and uneasy.

I opened my eyes and looked up at him from where I sat on the floor of my room. “Once upon a time, I taught you to knock,” I said by way of greeting.

“Once upon a time, you also taught me to dance,” Vader responded. “Neither lesson seems to have taken.”

I stared up at him, nonplussed. That was Anakin - purely Anakin - speaking. I was almost willing to bet my life on it.

“Your defiance of the Emperor gave you nothing but a wounded body. Why did you do that?” he asked, surprising me further by dropping to one knee in front of me.

“I didn't do it for me,” I said, staring directly into those soulless eyes.

The black helmet tilted to one side. “I had realized that. Obi-Wan, I admire your tenacity, but my ties to the Emperor are such that I do not think I have any remaining ability to put your lesson to use.”

I gritted my teeth at that, frustrated and angry. “You can't just give up.”

I had the sense that he was smiling at me, patient where I no longer was. “I did not give up, Master. I gave in.”

That hurt to hear. “Why?” I whispered.

“In light of certain events, I know you will find it both enraging and galling to hear the answer: I don't know.” Anakin hesitated. “All I know is that I felt as if I were sliding to an inexorable point that I had fought against my entire life. For some reason, I decided that I could fight no longer.”

“Then leave,” I said, frowning, my voice intense. “If you can't fight it directly, then at least get the hell out of here.”

“I cannot.” He stood, a quick movement, his cloak falling forward again to mask his shoulders and part of the ever-active computer on his chest that gave him breath and life. “I do, however, suggest you take your own advice. Leave here. This place is not for you. You are not like him. You are not like me. Do not become this.”

There was an uncomfortable mix of feeling in my stomach, swirling miasma and dreadful hope. This was my Padawan, my friend, my brother. I could not leave him here. Not like this.

As if sensing my thoughts, Vader sighed. “I did not think you would. You are a stubborn man, and eminently hopeful, even when all hope is lost.” He turned to go, then hesitated. “I know that you sense these moments, and try to use them. But Master, know this: Anakin Skywalker is dying. Slowly, surely, a little more every day. His grief and his rage eats him alive, feeding the existence of Darth Vader in his place. I do not think that even you have the power to stop that.”

I closed my eyes, feeling tears form to hear Anakin speak of himself that way. He knew. He knew why I stayed, and thought himself already gone. “I have to try.”

A faint laugh, amplified by the vocorder. “I know. We may speak again, Master. We may not. Doubtless this conversation has been recorded, and I will suffer great pain at my Master's feet.”

That made me angry, to know that Palpatine would strike out at Vader for something like this, to know that Anakin would slide into nothing, while Vader accepted it as due course. “Fight him,” I breathed out the words.

“I…cannot. May the Force be with you, Obi-Wan.”

I felt the old grief well up, though that core of rage was still with it. “I'm not dead yet, and neither are you,” I bit out.

“No,” he agreed, holding his palm up to the pad by the door, and it slid open in response. “Not yet.”

The door slid shut behind him, and then the tears did fall, but they were bitter. Hot liquid splashed against my hand, and I wiped it off on my black leggings. Anakin thought he was saying goodbye. I wasn't about to let that be the last word between us.

I swore under my breath, my brows drawn together in anger. Damn it _all._ The one thing Anakin needed was the one thing I could never give to Vader. Grief ate at him, and knowing that he had not lost everything with Padmé's death, that he had children, would be his balm. Yet the moment Vader dominated, he would rush his balm to his Master, to let their light be destroyed. I needed to find another way. I could not leave until I had exhausted every avenue at my disposal.

That, of course, was my mistake.

 

*          *          *          *

 

Time progressed, even though I seemed to have forgotten how to move along with it. I watched, waited, listened, and found myself disturbed by the width and breadth of power that Palpatine commanded. He had forged chains of loyalty and alliances only to burn them to ash when it suited him, and still he had the power to maintain his icy grip on most of the galaxy. The men who wandered the halls, avoiding my presence, were something he called Hands. They were human men, trained by Palpatine to use only the barest hints of their potential in the Force. They traveled unseen throughout the Empire to end dissent before it had a chance to arise. It was because of them that so many of our early cells for the Alliance were discovered, picked clean from the inside out.

Most of them looked normal, but a few bore the pale yellow eyes of corruption, willing and able to use the Dark side of the Force to achieve their Master's goals. I knew that they stayed their hands against my presence because of Palpatine's order, but it was after watching their behavior around Vader and the Emperor that I realized I had somehow been plunged into the same class as the Sith - something to be wary of.

I had moments where I wanted to scream at them: _I am not a blasted Sith!_ Except... if I wasn't a Sith, why was I here? What was I going to do, crack Vader over the head and drag him out of here? I had serious doubts about that working very well.

Instead, I kept my head down, kept an eye out for Vader, tried not to eat poison food, and tore the Emperor's personal library apart looking for a way to destroy Sidious without Falling in the process.

Weeks had passed, if I was still guessing the passage of time with some sort of accuracy. I was doing nothing more than procrastinating, at this point. There was only one book left. I had to admit I was afraid to pick it up, for Palpatine had begun his own writing. He called it _The Book of Anger._ In other circumstances, the title might have been funny, ludicrous in its own pretentiousness.

I didn't find it funny.

I stared at it, looking at the inconspicuous hard-bound book that sat all alone on its shelf, and felt like I was being taunted. _Here it is,_ it seemed to whisper. _Here is possibly the answer you seek, and you're afraid to touch it!_

I _was_ afraid to touch it. I was haunted by Darth Zannah's words: _You seek vengeance._ If I tried to kill Palpatine in the shape I was in now, I would be giving him exactly what he wanted. Me.

I frowned as the Force whispered to me of something approaching... someone familiar.

“Obi-Wan.”

I stopped breathing.

A step, the sound of a boot heel coming down on tiled library floor. A second step.

My cramped lungs forced me to breathe.

The tone was slightly hesitant, but no less commanding. “Obi-Wan.”

It could not be. I wanted to shout the words, but they would have been empty. I knew just how it could be. What had I been reading about all this time? What had Plagueis once done to a dark-haired slave woman working on Kabray Station?

What had Anakin himself said, just after the start of the war?

_I can't hear him anymore, Master. It's... it's like he's gone._

“Would you turn around, please?” Now there was a hint of teasing, the hardened steel fading back. “I dislike conversing with your backside.”

I almost laughed, for that was familiar. The Force was screaming at me, but it had been doing that for a while now. I settled for shaking my head. “I don't think I should do that.”

“Why not, my Padawan?”

“Because,” I whispered, trying to force the words past suddenly numb lips. “You should not be here.”

“Nevertheless, I am here.” Inexorable. Patient. “Look at me.”

I couldn't resist that, not that tone. I had been drilled to obey it for many years, lest my failure to pay attention cost us our lives. I blew out a long breath and then turned in one fluid motion, some part of me still convinced my little black-dotted hallucinations had metastasized.

I was fooling myself, of course. I wasn't hallucinating. He was dressed much the same way I was, black upon black - though I had to admit the silver-streaked hair against the soft black tunic was compelling. He was older than I remembered, but no less beautiful for it. It was his eyes that caught me the most, that same piercing blue, staring at me with hawk-like intensity. Then his mouth quirked in a small smile, turning his fierce expression into calming warmth. “You don't seem all that pleased to see me.”

“I…” I managed to say, my words strangled. I breathed out his name. “Qui-Gon. How—!”

He merely looked at me. “You know how.”

Yes, I did know how. “This is wrong,” I whispered. Some part of me was telling me so, something important, beyond even the horror I felt. For the life of me, I couldn't think of _what._

Qui-Gon Jinn, solid, real, and alive, took one step closer, stopping when I flinched. “I didn't mean to frighten you,” he said, his smile self-deprecating. “I know it's a shock.”

“No kidding,” I managed, licking my lips, trying to calm my heart and my mind. I was a Jedi Master. This was no time to fall apart, even if the only thing I wanted to do was fling myself into his arms. Not knowing what else to say, I settled for the truth. “I can't believe you're here.” I shook my head again. “You _cannot_ be here!”

“I could say the same thing to you,” he said, and this time when he stepped closer, I didn't flinch away. “Why are you here, Obi-Wan?”

“For Anakin,” I whispered. “I would have no business here otherwise.” Then I hesitated, realizing my words for the lie they were. I hadn't even known Anakin was alive until…

Maybe it was in my eyes, because he smiled. “Obi-Wan, it's all right. At the very least, you being here means a lot to me.”

“Does it?” He was still coming closer, stalking me, one step at a time, but I stayed my ground. What was I going to do, climb up the bookshelves to get away? Why would I even want to do that? The one thing I had wanted for over half of my life was standing in front of me, and right then I didn't give a damn if Sith magic had dragged him back into life.

And yet...

For the first time in weeks, I thought of Master Yoda. Yoda, who had teased me, referencing his conversations with Qui-Gon as the months rolled past since the Order had been destroyed. Yoda had never in his life lied to me. Shock and fear had given me the one moment of clear thinking I had desperately needed.

“I remember now,” I said, and in that moment I caught a hint of that familiar, putrid odor.

I saw red. There was no thought. I flew at him, a snarl caught in my throat, slamming us both into the closest wall. My arm across his neck, I screamed, “Drop it!”

Palpatine chuckled, his eyes now that abhorrent pale yellow, but no other trace of him was visible. “No, I think not.”

“Dammit! I said do it!” I roared, my hands feeling nothing but soft cloth, but it was an illusion. Nothing I was seeing was real except for his damned eyes.

He shook his head, breathing hard against my grip, and fetid breath wafted across my skin. “Tell me how you know of Force Illusion, and I'll consider it.”

“Natural talent,” I bit out. “Drop the illusion.”

He smiled, Qui-Gon's smile, and the sight of it broke something deep within me. I caught myself with my fist just shy of his face, hesitating, a war of indecision in my head. I wanted to hit him, I wanted to make the bastard pay for everything he had done to me, to Anakin, to all of us. Palpatine spoke in Qui-Gon's voice: “What would your Master say if he could see you now?”

I was shaking when I stepped back, my teeth gritted together. “Fuck you!” I hissed.

He laughed, and the duality of Palpatine’s voice now emerging from the image of Qui-Gon was making my head ache. “No, dear General. I think we both know that's one of the things that he would never say.”

All I did was blink, but when it was done, he was on the floor, the illusion gone. Blood was flowing from his lip, and my fist was clenched, throbbing pain in my knuckles. He dabbed blood away from his mouth with the sleeve of his black cloak, but he didn't attack me, as I expected. He laughed again, the sound full of joyous, maddening mirth.

I left the library with my hands over my ears, not wanting to hear that damned laughter anymore.

I dumped my cloak at the door, then scrambled the lock with the Force, overdoing it to the point that the electronic mechanism squealed in distress. I was shedding my clothing as I walked the short distance across the room to the 'fresher, and had ditched everything by the time I activated the shower and turned up the hot water to just shy of scalding. I wanted him off of me. I wanted his scent off of me. I wanted the entire encounter to Go Away.

I ducked my head under the spray, trying to speak one of the old codas for serenity, but in that moment I had forgotten the words. I was not serene. I was as far from serene as I could get.

I screamed, slamming my hands into the tile over and over again, because screaming and pain were better substitutes for my own thoughts. My eyes shut, I purged my rage on hapless ceramic, each blow cracking bones in my hands and destroying tile, smearing blood across the wall, leaving shards in my hands.

Then I sank to my knees, water pounding down on my back hot enough to burn, not feeling it, not caring. I opened my eyes and stared at my hands. Shards of glossy black shone in deep contrast to my skin, pale now. Blood was flowing sluggishly from multiple wounds, and my fingers... I tried squeezing them shut, gasping in pain when broken bone would not let joints bend. Not enough. It wasn't enough to get away from the thought dancing around in my mind, teasing me, taunting me.

I screamed again and thrust my hands into the hot water, watching the blood rinse from my skin, feeling hot water scour the damage I had just done myself. I could barely feel it. Rage and despair were mixed together, beating at me.

I almost hadn't cared.

I had wanted it to be real. Even when Palpatine's scent had struck my nostrils, revealing his presence. I had almost not cared. I wanted Qui-Gon badly enough, and I had almost been willing to throw away my sanity for it.

           

*          *          *          *

 

Rackthor was standing at my door, hand raised to knock, when I opened it. My hands still didn't want to work right, especially after I had pulled countless bits of tile out of them before mending bone, but it was enough to open doors, feed myself, or punch more people in the face if I needed to.

Something had the elder human on edge. “What is it?” I asked him. Rackthor had long gotten used to me circumventing him, and since I didn't hit him, throw things at him, or toss the poor man into walls, he didn't let it concern him. “My Lord, the Emperor... requests your presence,” he said, dropping his head in an abbreviated bow.

Well. That was fast. Barely six hours later. I wondered what he was up to now, and wondered at the timing of it. “Requests, or demands?” I asked. “And please stop calling me Lord. I can't stand it.”

“Demands,” Rackthor said in response, looking at me with those dead amber eyes. “If I phrase it more politely, it means you will go, and I do not have to worry about dangerous creatures in my bed at night. For that same reason, I also will not stop calling you Lord, as my Lord Sidious has suggested it is the thing to do.”

My lips drew back in a grimace of distaste. Lord was a title often used in Coruscant society, but I knew that wasn't what its purpose was. Not here. “I'm not a Sith, therefore the title is inappropriate,” I said, but I knew he wouldn't stop using it. “Very well. I will go.” I didn't want Rackthor's death on my conscience, even if I had the sense that Rackthor would probably thank me for it. I wouldn't put it past Palpatine to use anyone and everyone around me as fuel to get what he wanted.

I grabbed my cloak, draping it over my shoulders against the prevalent chill of Palpatine's residence, and followed Rackthor down dark halls.

The recreated Imperial throne was where he brought me, and I went on high alert, adrenaline flooding my system almost as an afterthought. I had not been back in this room since my arrival. Nothing about this could be good.

The throne was facing the other way, and Rackthor bowed low to it before making a hasty exit. I couldn't say as I blamed him. I wanted to be out of here, too.

“Leaving my company so soon, General?” Palpatine asked genially, the throne turning, so that Palpatine's shadowed visage became visible. Darkness fell around him like a cloak, obscuring all.

“I was considering it, yes,” I said, ignoring the tiny, horrible doubt I held that if I left here now, I had no safe haven to go to. That the Darkness I'd been surrounded by had crept in, all unawares, and I was now wearing it like a brand.

“Hmm. I do not think I will allow this,” Palpatine mused, making a show of thinking about a decision he had made weeks ago.

“What makes you think you have a choice?” I countered.

He smiled, showing rotting teeth, and I recognized the silent response: _What makes you think that_ you _do?_ “I do like our little games, General, but I think it is time for them to end.”

“What are you going to do, kill me?” I crossed my arms and stared at him. If that was his threat, he was going to have to try harder.

His grin faded, his eyes gazing upon me coolly. “No. I have something much more interesting in mind.” He waved his hand, and two cloaked members of the Imperial Guard entered, dragging something between them. No, not a something - a someone, a girl with long, dark blue hair, pale olive skin, and sparkling green, determined eyes. _No,_ I thought, not wanting it to be, but it was. Jeila Vin, one of the Padawans I'd run into after the fall of the Temple. She'd been one of the ones to join the Alliance, giving me her lightsaber to dispose of so it would not mark her as a Jedi. Our eyes met, and though she was apprehensive, I knew she would give Palpatine nothing.

“You have one chance,” Sidious spoke, and the anger that had been absent hours ago was there now, boiling just underneath the surface. “Kneel before me, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and I will spare her.”

I didn't believe that for a moment. Neither did Jeila, who shook her head, staring hard at me. I looked back at her, bile in the back of my throat, knowing that I couldn't save her and hating myself for it.

“Decide quickly, General,” Palpatine continued. “Your answer will determine whether she dies quickly…or slowly.”

Jeila and I were still staring at each other, but it was Jeila Vin who was unafraid of her fate. Her lip quirked up in a tiny, sad smile, and she nodded at me - all of the answer I needed. She knew her death was coming, one way or another, and the last thing she wanted was to see another Jedi brought low before Palpatine.

My mouth dry, I finally looked at Palpatine. “No.”

He tilted his head, affecting surprise, though I knew he was not. “No?” he repeated, his tone mocking.

Jeila was wearing a grim smile when I glanced at her, and in that moment I loved her, loved the strength of her spirit. Part of me was bitter, though. She would be the one to suffer for our defiance, but I was the one that was going to have to live with it. “No. My answer is no.”

“Pity,” was Palpatine's only response. Then his hand rose into the air again, and bolts of lightning arced from his fingertips, lancing through Jeila's body. She screamed, her entire body lit up as if from within. I realized I was screaming with her, screaming at Palpatine to stop, but he would not. There was an expression of fierce glee lighting his face, his mouth open in a rictus grin, as Jeila's body jerked against the iron-grip the Guards had on her. If they felt any pain from the lightning that struck Jeila, they did not show it.

After an interminably long time, Jeila slumped, lifeless, in their arms. Smoke was rising from her body, filling the air with the horrible scent of ozone and burnt meat. I wanted to retch and couldn't.

My mistake was in thinking it was over, that this would be all that Jeila would suffer. Then Palpatine laughed, and the Force coalesced around Jeila's body. Every single hair on my body stood on end as I felt the Force open up, felt Darkness rend it, and _heard_ Jeila scream in agony as she was forced back into her own lifeless body.

Palpatine grinned at me as Jeila continued to scream, the pain of wounds she could no longer escape from overpowering all else.

“Stop it,” I whispered, so horrified that I could barely comprehend what I was hearing, what I was seeing.

Sidious laughed. “You thought that Plagueis's wisdom had died with him? Fool,” he spat, and the laughter was gone in an instant, replaced by searing hatred. “I may not be able to create life, but this?” He gestured, lightning reformed, and Jeila jerked backwards, her head back, teeth bared and unable to utter a sound as electricity bombarded her. I felt the moment when life once more fled from her body, and again Palpatine dragged her back. Everything was purple and black as the Force raged against this intrusion into its natural order, trying to draw Jeila back to where she belonged in death, while Palpatine ripped and tore and raped with the Dark tools at his disposal until Jeila's essence was once more captured in her destroyed body.

“STOP IT!” I screamed, as the slight whisper of a broken sigh came from Jeila Vin's throat. “Stop it! Damn you, stop this!”

“No!” he roared back, and lightning split the air, highlighting the scene with horrific intensity. “You stop this, General!” His voice fell back to its normal, oily range. “Kneel at my feet, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and her pain will end. Hesitate...” With that he rent the Force again, and in the Force I heard Jeila screaming.

I could barely breathe. Defiance was forgotten. I could only see Jeila dying, suffering, dying again, her spirit being rendered to ash from the onslaught. “Please. Stop.”

“Make it stop,” Palpatine hissed, stepping closer to me. “It is within your power to end this.”

Yes. No—fuck, I didn't know. All I knew was that I couldn't let him destroy her. Not like this. “Yes,” I breathed out the word, barely aware of anything but Jeila's dwindling light in the Force as my knee hit the floor.

In that instant the tearing of the Force ceased, and I felt Jeila flee both in life and in spirit, surrendering to the Force. This time, the Force kept her, for Palpatine didn't fight it.

The moment she was gone I moved, my ignited lightsaber in my hand. My blade crashed against a dark red one that Palpatine produced from somewhere within the depths of his robe, and a rush of energy joined the clash of our blades. I shook it off, swung again, blind to anything but that red lightsaber and the monster wielding it.

It took me a moment to realize that he was laughing, even as he parried my blade. He was fast, so much faster than I could ever have expected if Yoda had not once told me of it. “Oh, General, you amuse me so!” he cried, and his free hand clenched into a fist.

I collapsed, too stunned to breathe, as my lungs were crushed in his terrible grip. My body spasmed against the attack, and when I coughed I tasted blood. Sparks danced in my eyes as I began to lose consciousness from lack of oxygen. I had enough sense left to mentally grumble that this was getting to be a common occurrence.

The last thing I saw was Sidious standing over me, smiling that happy, gleeful smile I had first seen during my aborted duel with Darth Vader. “The anger you wield, the fury! You, my vengeful Jedi. It is all yours. Vengeance is my name for you. When you awaken, you will be Darth Venge, and nothing else.”

 _No,_ I snarled the thought, even as I sank down into a dreamless void. _Never for you. Never._

           

*          *          *          *

 

I awoke in the room I had been given, found myself lying upon the bed, still dressed in tunic and breeches. I turned my head - my boots were beside the bed, and my cloak hung from the wall. My fingers felt stiff and clumsy, and a quick glance told me that my broken hands had been bandaged properly, though no healing had been performed.

I felt dizzy and sick, drained and empty. My head ached, my thoughts buzzed, and the terrible echo of Jeila Vin's death was still in my mind.

I rolled over and stumbled when my feet touched the floor, my head beginning a mild spin that told me I should visit the 'fresher and throw up. It wouldn't make me feel any better, but my body definitely thought it was the thing to do.

I made my slow way into the 'fresher, pausing when I saw the wide plate mirror that graced the sink. My own reflection looked back at me, showcasing blond hair that had decided to skip gray and start turning white at the temples. It looked as if some new white threads had appeared through the rest of the mess, too. My eyes were wild, haunted, and amber, the color amplified by the black I wore.

I stared for a long moment before I screamed and sent my fist into the glass, shattering the mirror and turning my image into a multitude as the damage spider-webbed outward.

 

*          *          *          *

 

I don't know how much time had passed when I emerged from my room again, still feeling that horrible buzz in my head and bitterness in my throat. The halls were darker than usual, set to observe a night cycle that didn't match Coruscant's in the slightest. There were no sounds as I walked, unsure of my destination, unsure of much other than the fact that hitting a mirror with still-broken fingers was a damned stupid thing to do. I hadn't been able to summon the energy to heal them - or perhaps it was the ability that was lost. I didn't know.

I had company before I realized it, his tall, dark form coming out of a corridor and falling into step beside me. I glanced up at Vader's expressionless mask and looked away, saying nothing. He would talk to me when he was ready, or he would keep following me around until I satisfied some bizarre ideal.

What possessed me to go visit the room in which Sidious kept his pet Hssiss, I'll never know. I stood outside the door, the harshness of Darth Vader's computerized breathing the only sound between us. Seized by some mad urge, I opened the door.

The smells of wood and damp struck me, carrying the undertones of urine and feces created by animals kept in confinement. The Hssiss, monstrous things, were not kept in cages, but had a pseudo-environment in which to play. They were in the center of the room, attracted by the opening door and the prospect of food. At three meters, they were little more than scale, tooth, spike, and claw, long ago mutated by the Dark side of the Force into a creature that could influence others with poison – or destroy them. They were sensitive to the Force as well, though their evolution made them seek out Darkness. They despised the Light, sought to destroy it. They were perfect pets for the Sith.

Some part of me was screaming that I was going to wind up dead, that I bloody well _knew_ better, but the rest of me ignored that voice, driven by some unidentifiable impulse. The Hssiss shrieked at me, swarming around and taking nips from each other’s hides, but as I approached they began to slink away, trying to hide in the shadows. This was new - the last time I had stumbled into this room, they had wasted no time in trying to take me apart.

“They fear you.”

I half-turned at Vader's approach; I had almost forgotten he was there. “They have no reason to,” I said, and was surprised to hear the raspy, broken quality of my own voice.

“Do they not?” Vader queried, his modulated voice softer than I had ever heard. He walked to stand next to me, and the Hssiss growled and retreated again. I stared at them, angered, dazed, and afraid. The reaction of the Hssiss told me all I could have ever needed to know about myself.

“I told you, Obi-Wan. You should have left here while you still had the chance,” Vader said.

I found myself slowly shaking my head. “No,” I said, thinking of Rackthor, of Anakin, of Jeila. “I never had that chance to begin with.”

 

*          *          *          *

 

I was dreaming, that I knew. While dreams weren't uncommon for me, they had been scattered, hazy things that I never remembered upon waking for a long, long time. This was clear and real, almost more resonant to me than the Emperor's black halls.

It was my companion in the dream that was making it all surreal.

Xanatos grinned as if hearing my thought. He was lying on a long couch that had no back to it, one leg sprawled off so that his booted foot rested on the floor, his hands laced behind his head. He was dressed as I was, all in black, but Xanatos made it look natural. His hair was still long, shining and darker than the clothing he wore. The broken circle marred the almost-perfection of his skin. His eyes were that same incredible shade of blue that had once entranced me on Bandomeer. “You're hanging out with the biggest black-hearted bastard of them all, and you think I make things surreal?” he asked, gracing me with a pleased smile.

I was standing some distance away, just staring at him and wondering what part of my brain I'd cracked this time. “Absolutely,” I told him. “It’s a gift you have.”

Xanatos laughed, and I was surprised anew by the richness of the sound. Dammit, now _that_ was walking – lounging -- sex. If Xanatos had still been around when I was young, I would never have had to deal with that 'walking embodiment of sex' nonsense that Siri Tachi loved to spout. Had loved.

Fuck. I sank to the floor, settling onto my knees with my head resting in my hands. “I'm going crazy,” I whispered.

“Well, yes, there is that,” Xanatos said, and through my fingers I noticed him swing his other leg over the couch to sit up and look at me, his more traditional sardonic smile firmly in place. “I would never have been able to talk to you, otherwise.”

That certainly caught my attention. “You died in Darkness,” I told him, annoyed. “Those who die in the throes of the Dark side cease to exist. Therefore, you cannot be real.”

He giggled, and there was only a slight touch of mania in his laughter. “You're cute when you're stupid, even now,” he said, leering at me. “Ahh, if I had but a thing for pubescent children, I would have kidnapped you then and had my sordid way with you when we first met.”

“Instead, you decided to enslave me. Decisions, decisions,” I said, shaking my head, starting to smile in spite of myself. I had to admit, something about Xanatos' presence was soothing, even comforting - which brought me back to my realization that I had to be crazy.

The leering vanished, a surprisingly gentle smile taking its place. “I have a story to tell you, so be a good little Jedi and listen, all right?” When I merely stared at him in response, he resumed speaking. “Once upon a time when I was still alive, I had a willful fit of temper because my Master, Qui-Gon Jinn, killed my not-so-loving father, Crion. To this _day_ I would not be able to tell you why I did so, but mental instability had certainly just been proven to exist in my lineage. I left Telos and wandered the galaxy, trying to figure out what to do with my life, even wondering if I should return to the Order and ask my Master's forgiveness for being a ridiculous git. Instead... instead I met a man who called himself Palpatine.”

I stopped breathing for a moment. Xanatos continued, nodding once in response to the stunned expression I had to be wearing. “He seemed kind, friendly, fatherly - all of those things I had wanted in Crion but had not received. My father thought of me as a means to further power, nothing more, and I began to believe that Palpatine could give me the fatherly affection I craved. I was wrong, oh so wrong. I had merely found another who saw me as a means to an end.” His expression became grim. “He saw that I had touched Darkness, and introduced me to more. He made me insane,” Xanatos said, his voice flat, his eyes bright and burning with remembered rage. “And in my insanity I blamed the one person who deserved no blame at all - my Master. I escaped Palpatine, or perhaps he let me go, seeing my need to create chaos as a useful application of my talents. You know the rest.”

I shook my head. “Not all of it,” I guessed. I had more thoughts, more questions, but the dream was taking on an urgent tone. It seemed wiser to let Xanatos speak.

Xanatos's lips curved up, sultry and moist. “Sexy and intelligent, after all. If I had but time enough, I'd keep you around a bit longer just to taste the parts of you the Jedi robes always hide.” I blinked, nonplussed, but he continued before I could begin to formulate a reply. “I didn't jump into a pool of acid out of some misnamed need for revenge, Obi-Wan Kenobi. I was desperate. I knew I had lost my way. I knew I did not wish death to my former Master. I knew that I didn't want to kill the child you once were, but I could no longer control myself. Desperate people do desperate things. How desperate are you, Obi-Wan Kenobi?”

“What do you mean?” I asked, some unnamed anxiety turning my stomach into a cold knot of dread.

Xanatos got up, walking towards me, and there was a definite slink in his gait. I didn’t move, as much as some part of me wanted to. He raised his hands, cupping my face, and before I could flinch away I realized that his skin was warm, not icy as I had expected. “Why are you here in this place?”

“I…” I closed my eyes, lowering my head. “I don’t know anymore.”

“Now who’s being the ridiculous git?” he asked, and I opened my eyes to find him kneeling in front of me, and there was perfect understanding in those velvet blue eyes. “Don’t worry about it. You will remember soon enough. You just need to ask yourself two things. Why are you here? And just how desperate are you to stop this?”

I woke up in that moment, staring up into blackness, the serenity I'd felt in the dream vaporizing like dust. Strange that I had felt eased in such a weird, unconventional dream.

I sat up in bed, rubbing my eyes with one hand. I wanted Palpatine dead, now more than ever. The why didn’t matter; it was the _how_ that was problematic. It was becoming obvious that Palpatine thought we had had our last conversation about my place here, about my path to the Dark Side. Part of me was still able to be shocked that he could make that kind of mistake, but the rest of me was too busy using this lapse to my advantage. He had done me the service of removing my last hesitation in the matter - now I had no compunction about using all of my rage against him.

I just didn't want that to be the only thing I used. I didn't want to wind up dead, and a lifetime of service to the Jedi meant that there were still lines that I would never cross. I just had to make sure that, for now, Sidious did not realize that those lines existed.

For the first time since my arrival, I sought out Palpatine. I found it was easier to avoid him than it was to track down the damned Sith Lord.

When I found him at last, he was standing in the room that Vader had introduced me to, looking at the holographic star map of his Empire. He ignored my approach, but I didn’t care, taking that moment to study the map myself. More of the galaxy was red than before. I tried in vain to find some outrage, some spark of ire that the Empire was conquering and enslaving yet more systems, and could not.

That bothered me even more than the Hssiss running in fear from my steps.

“Lord Venge,” he finally said, glancing at me. “It is considered appropriate to kneel in the presence of your Master.”

“Probably, but I find I am disinclined,” I replied. “Nor am I here for lessons in deportment, Palpatine.”

That got his attention, as I had intended. “Why do you not refer to me by my title, or my true name?” he asked, his voice low, dangerous.

“Anything that pisses you off can’t be all bad,” I said, glad of the ire that lit his baleful eyes.

Sidious waved his hand, and the hologram vanished. “Is it time to have another conversation about your obedience, my apprentice?”

I laughed, and even to my ears it was a bitter sound. “You’re the one who wanted a witty conversationalist around. At no point did you specify that I had to be a respectful one.”

Check that. There were far scarier things in the universe than a little apathy, and Palpatine smiling with true enjoyment at my words was one of them. Fuck, fuck, _fuck._

“You make a valid point, my friend. However, there are standards to maintain. When in the presence of others, you _will_ bow in respect, or you will pay dearly. And if your own pain isn’t enough, there are more Jedi children out there…”

“Not at the rate your other apprentice is hunting them down. What will you threaten me with when he can’t find anyone else?” I mused aloud, a sardonic smile of my own gracing my lips.

Palpatine was studying me, and I realized I probably shouldn’t have issued that sort of challenge. The Sith had already proven himself capable of raising torture to something near an art form. “What do you want, my friend?” he asked.

“You’ve been threatening to teach me the ways of the Sith since I got here. Well, here I am, Lord Sidious. Teach me.” I stared back at him, not flinching when he laughed.

“You ask, yet you still find me abhorrent,” he said, and I grinned.

“Always have, always will. And if you try to touch me again, I’ll swallow my own lightsaber blade just to avoid it,” I said, my tone fierce. I meant every word.

He was silent for a long moment, leaning on his spiral ebony cane, considering the matter. It seemed I had finally managed to get one move ahead in the game of chess we had been playing with each other. He had not expected me to come to him with this.

“If I teach you all that I know, you will try to kill me once more,” Palpatine said at last.

“Of course I bloody will!” I shouted. I lowered my voice and continued. “I thought that was the entire _point_.”

He frowned. “Explain yourself.”

“Vader will never try to kill you to take your place,” I said, smiling, even though I hated the thought. “You did your job too well, and while he will challenge your authority eventually, you and I both know that he still thinks of you as a friend. If you want the way of the Sith to continue, you need someone willing to challenge you.”

“Always the General, Lord Venge,” he said, dipping his head in acknowledgement. “Very well. I will teach you what all of those books and journals in my library cannot. On one condition.”

I gritted my teeth. I had a good idea of what his condition was going to be. “What is it?”

He only smiled at me, his eyes glinting in his shadowed face. Waiting.

I was swearing in my head in every language I knew, every word, as I mimicked Vader’s pose and dropped to one knee, bowing my head. “Master,” I whispered.

 

*          *          *          *

 

I didn’t have time for regrets any longer, or for fear. I only had time to learn, because eventually my mouth was going to spit out some snide comment at the wrong time, and I was going to become an interesting smear on Palpatine’s glossy black walls. As it was, I couldn’t resist pushing him, taunting him, flaunting my presence until Palpatine’s temper flared. Pain was becoming a constant companion, and I welcomed it, because it meant I still breathed. Sometimes he even repaired the damage he caused, which was how I discovered that Darkness could heal – though it always came with a price.

He never touched me, though. For all his rage, all his seeming willingness to destroy me, he never crossed that line again. It was bizarre to realize that he wanted me here, really wanted to teach me to be like him. Hells, I think he genuinely liked _me._

Sidious questioned me, deciphering what knowledge I had and had not picked up from his library, and I knew even he was surprised by the amount of Sith lore I had retained in my mad perusal of ancient tomes. Eventually that led to further explanations of each concept, and despite my own abhorrence, I did learn.

I hated it all. I hated myself for being so willing to understand it.

“I have learned that anger and will, joined together, give me the greatest power I have ever known,” Sidious said, and I lifted my head at his words. It was many days later, many lessons later, and he tended to drone on at times. This, at least, was interesting. “I can use them with such clarity and precision that I have opened new reservoirs of Dark side power.”

That was familiar. “You wrote that in your book,” I said.

He smiled, oily and condescending once more. “Reading it at last, Lord Venge?”

I nodded, feeling my lips curl in a sneer. “Difficult material, though. You’re as petulant and wordy in your way as Darth Valath was in his.”

“There is nothing wrong with eloquence, dear General,” he said, not bothered by my criticism of his writing abilities.

I declined to taunt him further, since my head was still aching from the last time I’d pushed him too far. “What the hell do your Force Storms do? You write of them, and of your fear of them—”

“I do _not_ fear them,” he hissed at me.

I tilted my head, smiling. I had struck a nerve. “Of course not. You do not describe what they do, though I’m sure a massive amount of destruction is involved.”

He got up from his replica throne, where he had decided our interesting lessons in Sith abilities were to take place, walking with slow steps across the room. He was leaning heavily upon his cane, and had come to rely on it more and more as the days passed. When he spoke next, I was surprised by the soft tone of his voice. “They destroy _everything_ ,” he said. “When a Force Storm is unleashed, nothing before it can stand. The very nature of the universe is changed.”

I felt cold. “That’s not possible.”

He chuckled. “All things are possible, my friend. You know this as well as I. The Force is in all things, and therefore has the power to change all things. The very science of life falters in the path of my rage.”

“You speak of these storms altering the atomic nature of physical objects. That breaks all the laws of nature. Why would the Force allow this, when it destroys the very thing it creates?”

He looked at me, calm and still. Really, aside from his persona as Chancellor, it was the most peaceful expression I had ever seen him manage. “Will is the most powerful ally of the Sith, Lord Venge. Even the Force bows down in recognition of it.”

I wanted to deny it, but I’d seen it. I’d watch him prove that point with Jeila Vin. “What else do they do?”

“What makes you think they do other things?” he asked, starting to smile, amusement lighting his eyes. I wished he didn’t take such pleasure in my insights.

“Because, deny it or not, these storms do frighten you, Lord Sidious,” I said, using the balance of speaking his name to combat the fear he did not want to admit to. “If destruction was their only use, I don’t think you would write about them. They would not be special, for any Sith can destroy.”

He began walking again, pacing, even though I knew it was causing him pain. “You see into the heart of many things, Lord Venge. Yes, the Storm does other things.” He fell silent again, and if I had not learned patience at the feet of Master Yoda, the most inscrutable being I have ever known, I would have yelled at him to hurry the hell up. Finally, he spoke. “They open doors,” Palpatine said, and there was a lilt of wonderment in his voice. It made my blood run cold, for it was not a common emotion for a Sith. “I have been able to send things from one end of the galaxy to the other with the aid of my storms.”

With one breath we had jumped from destruction to quantum fucking _physics_. “But you cannot control these storms – you said so yourself.” It was a safer question than wondering if he’d used these storms on living beings. I was almost certain I didn’t want to know. There was a damned good reason that Republic scientists had stopped pondering the notion of direct wormhole travel, sticking with the subspace pockets utilized by hyperdrives.

“No,” he said, his eyes dark as he looked at me. “Not yet. In time, all things are possible.”

I stared back, one thought whispering in the back of my mind. _I am not going to allow you that time._

*          *          *          *

 

I should have expected it, given all that I was learning of this place. Yet when Rackthor came to me and asked me to kill him, I was caught off-guard.

“Why the hell would I want to do something like that?” I asked, staring at the man. It was an honest question. I had grown used to Rackthor’s presence, for despite his despair, he was the sanest man in the entire damned building.

“Is it not something that Sith do – kill those who ask for death?” he replied, no hint of emotion on his weathered face.

I raised an eyebrow at him. “Probably. Is that what I am now, to you?”

There was a spark in his eyes, something there and gone before I could identify it. “You are what you are, Lord Venge,” he said, giving me a half-bow. When he straightened, that spark was back, but try as I might I could not fathom what he was thinking.

I found myself in the midst of reaching into his mind to find out when I stopped, horrified. _What the_ fuck _am I doing?!_

If my own conflict was visible, Rackthor did not acknowledge it. “Did you perform acts of mercy as a Jedi during the war?” he asked.

I hesitated, torn. Yes, I had. Once. It had been that, or watch as Knight Oma del Mar died in screaming, mind-wrenching agony. Durge had thrown her into a pool of acid, one of many surrounding us on that hellish planet, and it had eaten away her legs, her hips, even part of her abdomen, and still she lived, pleading with me to end her life before her final moments were nothing but despair. Force help me, I had done as she asked, and in return had felt a sweet whisper in the Force, a blessing from her departing spirit.

It hadn’t lessened the horror I’d felt in that moment, the dark, driving despair.

Rackthor smiled at me, his lips so dry that it looked more like a grimace. “You do not need to tell me. I see the answer in your eyes. And so I am asking you, Obi-Wan.” I started at that, for he had never called me by my real name in all my time here. “I am dead, and have been for some time, but instead of release I have been forced to keep walking, keep breathing.”

I stared at him, a whisper of intuition bringing a question to my lips. “How old are you, Rackthor?”

He drew himself up to his full height, though it took him great effort. Like the Emperor, his body was worn, tired, breaking. “I am twenty-nine years old.”

“Sith,” I whispered, the word a curse and a cause. I had read of their ability to drain the life force of others, but seeing it was ever so much worse. I had thought Rackthor to be in his eighth or ninth decade, not his third.

He nodded. “I am dying, but in my prolonged death I feed Lord Sidious’s life and power. If you wish to one day destroy Lord Sidious, start with me.”

I thought about it, and realized I could not. There were too many repercussions to that act, not to mention the fact that Palpatine might again question my willingness to endure here. “No.”

He nodded. “I thought you would say that.” With that he brought out a blaster I had not even sensed and fired at me.

I bit off a curse and fended off the bolt with my hand and the Force, and then another with my now-lit lightsaber as he continued to fire. “Stop this!” I roared.

“No,” he said, and kept firing, his expression calm, unfathomable.

Anger rose within me, a sharp feeling of betrayal accompanying it. Rackthor was the closest thing to an ally I had in this place. I had been wrong to think of him that way. I reached out, my hand raised in a swatting motion, and the Force answered my call with willing, malign eagerness.

The blaster crumpled against the wave of energy that struck it, but that was not all that crumpled, for the strength that I had called was vast. Rackthor was flung backwards, and I could hear multiple sharp cracks as bones were crushed, pulverized by a wave of my hand.

I stood stock-still, my lightsaber humming in the silence that followed. I breathed in sharp gasps, staring at his still form, shocked. Is that what Palpatine, what Anakin, found so addictive? The power that flowed with but a thought? The anger that drove it, brushing all threats from their paths?

They were right, the Sith and the Jedi. It was easy, all too easy, to become used to this power, to seek it out. Never before in my life had I felt like this. My head was swimming as I walked over to Rackthor’s body. He was still alive, but only just, his breath a soft rattle in his chest. I dropped down beside him, touched the cold skin of his shattered hand.

“Thank you,” he whispered. That broke whatever wall had kept emotion at bay, and I whispered a curse as guilt surged within me.

_What have I done?_

“Why did you do that?” I asked, gently reaching to cradle Rackthor’s broken body in my arms, feeling life flee his body.

He smiled at me, and I was shocked to notice that his eyes were no longer amber. They were brown, gentle, and full of peace. “Because…dear Jedi…I wanted to go home.” He sighed in my arms, and was gone.

I stared down at that serene face, shaken to the core. _How desperate are you, Obi-Wan Kenobi?_ Xanatos’s voice taunted me. And then he spoke again, saying something that had not been part of the dream: _You must choose the path you wish to walk._

Sidious was less than pleased to discover I had killed his favorite servant. “I did not give you leave to destroy him!” he seethed.

“I didn’t realize I needed your permission to be what I am,” I hissed back. “You have the width and breadth of an Empire at your back, Lord Sidious. What is one life in the face of that?”

He growled at me. “Rackthor served his purpose, Lord Venge. And without him here to continue to serve, I will have to rely on you, instead.”

Palpatine raised his hands, and purple threads of energy grew from his fingertips, reaching and seeking. I stepped back, but they were faster than I was. One touched my skin and I screamed, for the touch _burned_ and pulled, and I was trying to swat at it when another and another touched me and they were all _cold_. Cold fire was swallowing me, and it was in the midst of crippling pain that I realized what he was doing. Force Drain – the very thing that had aged Rackthor into a near-lifeless husk. I had read about it in Valath’s journal. The Sith Lord had thought it was funny, even as it was a great way to increase his life and power. All this I remembered, and then I felt my soul tear as part of my own life was ripped from me.

 _No!_ I cried, for in my insane quest for knowledge I had indeed found defense. I howled, agony and anger, reaching with the Force and grabbing hold of those cursed purple threads. In one snap of thought I rejected the Force-drain, backfeeding it into Sidious.

A scream was my answer, and I bared my teeth in a fierce grin of triumph as I opened my eyes and found Palpatine on his knees, gasping, one hand clutched to his chest. “That counts as touching!” I yelled.

He snarled at me. “Curse you, Jedi, for learning too well.”

I smiled, offering him a mocking bow, ignoring how unsteady on my feet I was. I was hiding it well, but Palpatine’s attack had just drained me to my core. No wonder Rackthor had insisted upon his death, if he had endured that horror for so long.

I watched, wary, as Sidious slowly regained his footing, calling his ebony cane back into his hand. “Come with me,” he said, calm once more, but it was a calm I did not trust. “I have something you must see, my intriguing Apprentice.”

I shrugged and followed. Really, what else could I do?

Palpatine led me into the very heart of his home, a place I had never been, since it would have meant fighting my way through three doors that were always guarded. Despite my new rank, my passage here had always been denied. Now I followed Sidious into a well-lit room, and a smell assaulted my nostrils that I hadn’t encountered in some time – nutrient feed for cloning tanks.

I muttered something Huttese and foul under my breath, spying five clear cylinders. They were all sized to house fully grown adult human clones. Each of them was occupied, and as I turned to question Sidious, I realized that he had collapsed into a chair, one that had been placed in the midst of the cloning tanks. There was a flux in the Force that I knew.

He was dying.

He lifted his head, his breath coming in shallow gasps, and instead of relief, all I felt was cold dread. He knew his body was failing, but he had not come here to die. I looked at him, and then at the clones, their faces carrying the innocence of youth to the furrows of old age, and all at once I knew what he had done.

“Force,” I whispered, horrified. “How old _are_ you?”

He grinned at me, the expression strained, and the Force warned me of the death that was about to occur. “Three decades older than the Empire will ever know,” he said, and with that he died, the Force exploding outward as the corrupt energy his body held spread outward.

I ducked, almost forgetting to shield, shocked as I was. Force take me for a fool, I could have ended it all right then. I could have destroyed the clones with but a thought, had I been thinking.

When it did occur to me that I knew just how to stop him, it was too late. The clone that was closest to his publicly known physical age opened his eyes, and the tank began to cycle in acknowledgement of the gained consciousness.

I was still staring a moment later when the cylinder opened and Palpatine stepped out, naked and streaming glop from the tank. A droid that I hadn’t even noticed trundled forward, and in its arms was a soft black robe.

Once robed, he turned his attention back to me, standing tall and proud, a mocking smile on his face. “Do you still think you can destroy me so easily, Lord Venge?” he whispered.

I spun in place and strode from the room, my jaw clenched in helpless anger.

Damn, but he was good. In another life, the bastard must have been an actor of the highest caliber. Sidious played his ailing body and age to the hilt. His Hands never noticed the difference, that his features were less distorted than they had been. True, he kept his face cloaked in shadow, but even to me, he seemed… fresher. I shook my head. Gods, now there was a bad joke if I’d ever heard one.

Even Vader never realized the difference, and I knew that this was another thing that Palpatine would never share with his other apprentice. I didn’t even understand why he had shown _me._ What point did it serve? Disillusionment? If Palpatine thought I would stop plotting his death because of an increased level of difficulty, he was in for a surprise. I didn’t give up that easily.

 

*          *          *          *

 

“What are you going to do?” Xanatos asked me that night, stalking me in my dreams once more.

I was the one sitting on the backless couch now, watching him. He was leaning against the wall, lanky arms and long legs and dammit, Siri was a gods-awful influence on me.

He smiled, and I knew he had heard the direction my thoughts had gone. “Thank you. Now be a good little Jedi and answer my question, Obi-Wan.”

“Well…” I lay back on the couch and looked up, somehow not surprised to find that overhead there was only a canopy of stars. My breath hitched in my chest. I hadn’t realized how much I missed the night sky until that moment. I couldn’t remember the last time I had looked up at the stars, couldn’t remember the last time I had seen a sun, a moon.

“They are beautiful, aren’t they?” Xan asked, and I wondered when I had decided to start calling him by the short name I had once heard Qui-Gon use. It felt right, though. Damn, but I had weird allies sometimes.

I nodded in response to his words. “Always. You know that I can’t answer your question, Xan.”

I turned my head to look at him, saw that the sardonic smile was still in place. “I know. I’m glad you realize that, too. I wish that we could plan and scheme together, my beautiful General.” He sighed. “That chance cannot be taken. I mean, fuck – what if I’m _not_ real?” He looked distressed. “Gods, what a creepy and morbid thought that is.”

I grinned, because I understood. Force, how I understood him now. “If it’s any consolation, I think you’re real.”

His blue eyes gleamed, and though I had never seen him happy in life, I was seeing happiness in him now. He was beautiful, black-hearted bastard or not. “No wonder Qui-Gon loved you,” I whispered, my heart gripped by familiar sadness. “No wonder he couldn’t…”

“Shut up, you,” he said, giving me a pointed glare. “Leave despair at the door, for it will not serve you here. Anger and will, love and hope, Obi-Wan. Those are your tools now. Use them well.”

“I will.” I sat up, swallowing when I discovered my throat was dry. “Xan… I do have a plan,” I said, giving him a grim smile.

“Oh, good,” he said, and he offered me a wide, predatory grin in return. “Have fun storming the proverbial castle, Master Jedi. Do try not to get killed.”

I was waking up and knew it, but I couldn’t resist one last jab. “There is no try.”

“Bastard!” was Xanatos’s only response.

 

*          *          *          *

 

_Darth Venge! You will attend me._

I grimaced at that hated voice, grabbing my lightsaber from its place on the table. For a moment I stopped, running my thumb along the hilt. I had carried this one longer than any other, and if I listened for it I could hear the whispered singing of the Adegan crystals that Kimal Daarc had once given to me. I wondered why it was that I still possessed a blue-bladed lightsaber in a sea of red. Stubbornness? Denial?

Anger and will. Love and hope. I clenched my lightsaber tightly in my hand.

I remembered why I was here, why I had stayed. One way or another, it was time to do what I had risked life, sanity, and spirit for.

I clipped the lightsaber to my belt, my fingers brushing the edge of a controller that was tucked just out of sight as I did so. _Please, let this work,_ I prayed, my words a whisper to the Force. _Please, just give me this one chance. Let me try to make things right._

When I arrived in the recreated throne room of Palpatine’s dark residence, it was to find the Sith Lord and Darth Vader already waiting. Sidious was seated on his throne, Vader a black sentry standing tall at his side. Jeng Droga stood on the other side of the throne, and I felt a fissure of unease. Rarely did the captain of the Hands put in an appearance. He shared a bond with Palpatine, much as Vader did, and was utterly loyal to the Sith. Droga noticed my eyes upon him and dipped his head in acknowledgement of my presence, a snide smile making a swift appearance.

I stifled a derisive laugh. I didn’t like him, either.

“Lord Venge, you will stand with Lord Vader. We have acquired a new guest, and I wanted you to be here to meet her,” Sidious said, waving his hand in my direction.

I did as asked, wondering at his evident pleasure. There was a long, long list of beings that Palpatine wanted his hands on, but I couldn’t even begin to guess who would be important enough to rate being brought down here. While he had kept me away from most Imperial business, that didn’t mean I hadn’t been paying attention to what was going on above.

Thank all the gods for the impenetrable shielding I had learned to make. Thank long years of Jedi training for the ability to keep my thoughts from my face, from my eyes, else everything would have been lost in that moment.

It was Senator Mon Mothma, being hauled in by two of the unyielding members of Palpatine’s Imperial Guard. She was pale, her clothes soiled, and her hair had been hacked off at the nape of her neck, leaving the dirty red strands to cling to her face. Her hands were shaking, but there was anger in her eyes as she was brought before the Emperor she had sworn to dethrone.

“Senator,” Palpatine greeted her with a wide, dreadful smile. “It was kind of you to grace us with your presence,” he said, his tone mocking.

“As if I had a choice,” Mon Mothma said, standing up and shaking off the grip of the guards. They let her, knowing that she had nowhere to go. “I find your company most disagreeable of late, Emperor Palpatine.”

He laughed at her, watching her as carefully as I was. I saw her take in Darth Vader’s presence without surprise, but then her eyes met mine, and she gasped.

Part of me quailed at the stunned horror in her eyes. Mon Mothma believed I had betrayed her. She thought I was the reason she had been captured and brought to this dark place.

I couldn’t even tell her that it wasn’t true.

Now she was afraid, and I couldn’t blame her. “You are a traitor to the Empire, Mon Mothma,” Palpatine spoke again, interrupting my thoughts. “I know you have played a great part in that foolish little rebellion of yours. The penalty for treason is death.” He leaned forward, his tone softening. “Of course, if you tell me all that you know, you may yet walk out of here. There is room for… forgiveness, in my Empire. Is there not, Lord Venge?”

I hissed out a breath, looking at Sidious without turning my head. “For some.”

“There, you see?” he said, his voice the only sound in the room other than Vader’s constant mechanical breathing. “The choice is yours, Senator.”

Mon Mothma glanced at me one more time, and there was still fear there, but the anger was back. I saw her jaw clench, saw her chin raise, and she glared at the Emperor in stony silence.

Palpatine wasn’t fazed. “Have it your way, then,” he said, giving her a dark smile, and I flinched as I felt the mental assault begin.

I don’t know how long I stood next to Vader, who remained unmoving through it all. I don’t know how long it took before she could no longer bear the pain Palpatine was causing her, tears pouring down her face.

She never made a sound. It was that defiance that fascinated me, that kept my eyes on her even though I wanted to look away. I knew what it was like to feel those mental claws rake through my head, and yet she withstood it. No wonder Padmé had admired this woman so. She had a rare strength, a serenity of presence that I had once found soothing. The Alliance was going to fall apart without her.

My right hand touched my lightsaber, brushed against the controller hidden there. _Soon…_

I was surprised when, moments later, Sidious ceased his efforts, his eyes glinting with fury. “Captain Droga,” he said, his voice harsh with anger.

“My Lord,” Droga responded, bowing once before leaving the room. Whatever information they had shared, they had done so privately.

“Lord Venge,” Palpatine said my name again, and I gritted my teeth and inclined my head in response. “The Senator is of no further use to me. Kill her.”

I walked forward without comment, stepping down the stairs of the dais. Mon Mothma watched me approach, refusing to be cowed. She raised her chin, pride warring with the fear that I could feel. Her sense in the Force was awry, telling me of the hurt that Palpatine had caused her.

We were of similar height, so when I finally stood before her, we could look directly into each other’s eyes. “Brave little Senator,” I whispered, touching Mon Mothma’s face with my hands. I was surprised when she didn’t flinch from my touch.

I smiled when I realized what had angered Palpatine so. Aside from a few transitional things that Droga would have to race to find, Sidious had learned almost nothing of value from Mon Mothma. The bastard hadn’t known what I did – that Yoda and I had sat with each ranking member of the Alliance, teaching them how to protect themselves from mind probes. Not everyone would be able to stand up to Palpatine, but Mon Mothma had the strength of spirit to fight a Sith’s mind rape.

All of this in seconds, and time was precious. I had already made my decision. I made it the moment I had seen the flash of Mon Mothma’s steel-gray eyes.

_I will not walk this path._

I had one of my throwing knives in my hands with one swift movement, and her eyes widened at the sight of the silver blade. I flipped it around in my hands and ripped it through the tough plastic of her wrist binders. I spoke one word. “Run.”

Mon Mothma, bless her, stared at me in stunned incomprehension. I would have worried that Palpatine had broken her if I had not seen his anger with my own eyes. “Run, you stupid bitch!” I yelled, putting every ounce of Force suggestion into the command that I could muster.

She ran without looking back, ducking under the arm of one of the guards. My lightsaber removed his arm before he could grab for her again. Another sweep of my blade and he died, his Force pike falling to the ground with a clatter. The other guard fared worse, igniting his pike just in time for my blade to remove his head from his shoulders.

I turned to see Palpatine rising from his throne, and the cowl of his hood shadowed his features. “I am… disappointed, my apprentice.” I couldn’t see his expression, but I could feel his anger almost as if it were a living thing. “Your efforts are futile. She will not get far.”

I tilted my head, smiling, and touched the Force, letting it ripple outward. It touched every living thing in Palpatine’s residence, Hands and all. They crumpled in the midst of what they were doing, falling into a deep sleep that would last for hours. “And now her path is clear,” I said. “As is mine.”

Palpatine sighed before beckoning Vader forward. It was then that he finally spoke. “Obi-Wan, why do you betray our Master like this?” His voice carried no hint of emotion, no surprise. Darth Vader was simply waiting for his next instruction, fully in the thrall of his Emperor. Anakin Skywalker was no more. It was time to let him go.

“I am not a murderer,” I said. This was the line I drew. Rackthor had forced me into killing him, counting on my anger to consume me, but there was no one in this room who could make me murder an innocent. Leaving Anakin on Mustafar had been the closest I’d ever come to crossing that line. I would never be that close again. “I won’t kill anyone I don’t have to. Not even for you.”

Sidious bowed his head, as if saddened. The effect was spoiled by the dark glee he broadcast through the Force. “Lord Vader: leave us. I have one final lesson for your former Master. Find the Senator. Kill her when you do.”

Vader bowed low. “It will be done, Master,” he said, and left without looking back.

I didn’t think Vader would catch her. The Chandrillan woman still had allies on this planet, friendships that were much older than Palpatine’s reign. I couldn’t spare a thought for her any longer, though. It was time to fight for my own life.

“You have learned much in your time here,” Sidious said. That was true, as much as I wanted to deny it - what I had just done to the denizens of his palace I would have found impossible to accomplish before placing myself into the bastard's tutelage. “Even if you defeat me here, you know that I will not die.”

“I would not be so certain of that,” I said, removing the controller from my belt and holding it up with two fingers. “You showed me weakness in your death, Lord Sidious. Clone banks are controlled by computers, and computers are easy to fool. This controller is programmed to activate a virus in the system, which will identify all of your genetic material as faulty. The system will go on standby after purging the flawed clones, refusing to create more until a new genetic sample is supplied.”

He stepped forward, and the light brought his features out of shadow, revealing the breadth of his rage. I winced as the controller sparked in my hand, becoming useless. “Fool,” he whispered. “Your little toy is not enough to stop me.”

“Who is the more foolish here, Lord Sidious?” I said, a grim smile on my face. “You have stopped nothing. I activated the virus while you were mind-raping our guest.”

That made him hesitate, and I felt the Force ripple outward, seeking… “Damn you!” Sidious roared, and I grinned in the face of his fury. “Do you know how much work you have destroyed?”

“Oh, yes,” I replied, feeling a rush of satisfaction. “I know exactly what I have done.”

He raised both hands, lightning forming and rushing through the air in the blink of an eye. I caught it with my left hand, ignoring the pain from the jagged rush of electricity as I captured it, molded it into a ball of fierce light. I had only ever seen one being do something like this before. I hoped the little green troll would be pleased. “Tickles,” I said, and flung it back in his direction.

He batted the energy ball aside with a curse, and there was a new wariness in his eyes. This time he pulled his lightsaber from its hiding place, igniting it, his mouth set in a grim line. “If you choose this path, you will die,” he hissed.

I shrugged, making my way back up the steps of the dais, ready to fight a war. “Some things are more frightening than death,” I said, and my lightsaber whipped around to block when he lunged at me with inhuman speed.

He swung again, shifting down, reversing the blade and sweeping across me in a wide arc that I dove into, my blade crashing against his when I forced him to counter instead of attack. This I could do. Training Anakin was the gift that allowed me to stand my ground against one of the most talented wielders of a lightsaber in the galaxy.

Palpatine gnashed his teeth at the ferocity I presented him with, and the hand that wasn’t holding his lightsaber clenched in a fist.

I met the wave of Force energy head-on, feeling it beat past my shields. He succeeded only in pushing me across the floor, unharmed, and I laughed at his angry frown. “You didn’t really think that I kept pissing you off because I liked pain, did you?” I taunted, shaking my head, drops of sweat flying off the ends of my hair. “Hit a man enough times with a weapon, and he’s bound to figure out how to counter it sooner or later.”

Palpatine’s scowl reminded me of a mutinous, volatile child. “Do you know how many plans had to be altered because of your meddling?” he retorted. “How often you galled me with your ability to defy all expectation? How many times I was assured of victory, only to find it marred by your very _presence_?”

I couldn’t help but smile. “And you kept me around anyway? I thought the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again while expecting a different response!”

His only answer was to strike me again and again with variations of attacks in the Force, and I gritted my teeth and _held_ , keeping the energy from buffeting me, and after a moment to adjust, I started flinging it right back, infuriating the Sith.

I was sort of appalled to realize that I was enjoying myself.

As the battle progressed, though, something was tilting, going awry. Wrong, wrong, something was _wrong._ I could feel power building, could sense it, but I could see nothing. I had no idea what he was up to, and all I could do was keep fighting. Give no ground, refuse to give in to the hatred he broadcast, the fear he tried to shove down my throat. Avoid the Force grips and the attempts to crush me, score a lightsaber burn on his cheek that caused him to howl with rage…

He stumbled back, touching his face, and then the howling ceased. He was winded, panting for breath, visibly exhausted. What the hell from? I knew his reserves were stronger than this.

It was when he started laughing that I knew I was in real trouble. “Oh, Lord Venge. If you could only see…”

I held my lightsaber up in traditional Form IV guard position, only then realizing I was breathing heavily as well. “See what?”

His lips curved up in an ominous smile. “You will know the power of the Dark Side,” he said, and looked up.

I followed his gaze, and found the source of that power-build above us as the Force Storm Sidious had called manifested itself in our reality in a rush of dark energy.

I dropped back, stunned, already being buffeted by wind and random tendrils of trailing power from the Sith’s infernal creation. Gods. I stared in awe at the maelstrom above my head. Energy was everywhere, and there was no rhyme to it, no reason. The Force was shrieking in my head, such was the _wrongness_ of what Palpatine had done!

I didn’t know how to defend against that, against something that, once started, even the most powerful Sith Lord in existence couldn’t control. I met his eyes, feeling electrical sparks start to dance off of my skin. Sidious grinned at me, offering me an almost-jovial wave, right before I was swallowed by the storm. I had an overwhelming impression of bright, blinding light, of soul-crushing energy that ripped the very air from my lungs…

…and then nothing.

I awoke to confusion, my eyes shooting open the moment I had my awareness back. I fought to breathe, my lungs not wanting to work. I gasped, barely able to move, and my fingers clawed at smooth cold flooring as I struggled to get enough air. My nerves were shot, nothing wanted to work right, and the only sound I managed was a soft, defeated whimper.

I felt like I had been torn apart. There was no comparison to the pain that burned in me, leaving me on the verge of a scream that I could not voice.

Slowly, I began to realize that I was still in that dark, bleak throne room, lying some distance away from where I had been before the storm coalesced upon me. I could see the flags of ancient Sith armies hanging above my head, black and red, but they were spinning, blurring together. I couldn’t shut my eyes against the constant vertigo.

There was a soft touch to my hair, and even through utter disorientation I knew that it was Palpatine. I managed to turn my head just enough to see him, found him on his knees next to me. It was the expression on his face that shocked me to my senses, left me wondering if I had somehow been flung into some strange, paradoxical reality.

Those eyes were still amber, but there was a strange gentleness in them now as he regarded me, his right hand still petting my hair. Gods, but it was a soothing touch, and abhorrent nonetheless. “Now you know, Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

“Know… what?” I managed, forcing the words past numb lips, my throat convulsing from the effort.

“Now you know the strength of the Dark Side,” he said, and like the strike of a serpent, his wrath returned. “I should destroy you, and you will soon wish that I had, Lord Venge. You will serve me because I will it to be so!” he shouted, and I flinched away from that horrid attack on my still-oversensitive ears. Then he leaned in close, his voice once again the barest whisper. “There are things that you know… about this foolish little Alliance… and other things. An heir to the Skywalker legacy, perhaps?”

My eyes widened. _No._ He couldn’t have known!

Fetid breath washed over my abraded skin as Palpatine chuckled. “You will live until I have scraped every last bit of knowledge from your brain. And then, perhaps, you will serve, existing only to carry out my will.” The hand that had been petting my hair gripped and pulled, forcing me to draw in a ragged, pain-filled breath. “In the end, my friend… all will be as I have foreseen. The Jedi will be no more.”

 

*          *          *          *

 

I sat in my cell – if you could call it that. There was a sterile mattress pad placed on top of a metal bunk that had been bolted to the cement floor. There was a window, too small to even fit my head through, which offered a stunning view of the next building’s exterior. There was a ‘fresher… sort of. It looked to be a combination sink and toilet. It also looked as if it had been cleaned sometime in the last millennium, and I wasn't interested in taking a closer look to confirm that.

Somehow I’d managed to crawl onto the bunk after being tossed unceremoniously into my new home, and after a long time, I managed a sketchy healing trance. It was enough to get me thinking clearly again.

Time was short.

Palpatine knew about Anakin’s children, or at least one of them. He didn’t know where they were. I did. I gritted my teeth, despite the pain it caused. I’d never had chronic - whatever it was called, I couldn’t remember now - from overexposure to electricity, but this was probably it. Everything ached and buzzed, and my sight tended to double and triple as I looked around. Whatever it was called. Terza would know. Would have known. I covered my mouth with my hands and screamed. It was a hell of a way to re-center myself, but it worked. _Terza is dead. Focus, damn you._

I knew almost everything about the fledging Alliance, who had founded it, where they dwelled. I knew where some of the surviving members of the Jedi were hiding. I knew where Yoda stayed on Dagobah, hidden by the darkness of the rogue Jedi who had died there. Messily.

 _I’m sorry, Qui-Gon,_ I thought, blinking back sudden, useless tears. _I think I’ve botched everything rather spectacularly._ _Though, as long as I remain uninterrupted for a good ten minutes, you’ll get the opportunity to tell me so in person._

I would not live by kneeling at Palpatine’s feet. Death was by far a kinder fate.   

I rolled back off of the bunk, ignoring the pain that flared as my knees and palms impacted with rough concrete. I grabbed the metal supports of the bunk, one at a time, testing for movement. The third one was loose. There was a screw mounting it to the floor that had not been seated properly, and I cursed as it wiggled in its thread but would not release.

I didn’t have time for this. With my lightsaber gone, my knives missing, my options were limited. Someone was bound to get impatient, come along, and kick me in the head some more. I had no idea how long I'd been in the healing trance. I still wasn’t sure how I’d even managed one in the first place. “Come on, damn you!” I yelled, kicking at the support strut. The strut broke, and the screw popped free and flew across the cell. I scuttled after it, afraid that if I took my eyes off of it that it would disappear.

Once it was safely in my hands, I looked at the damage my left foot had taken when the strut broke. My boots, abused through years of warfare, had finally decided enough was enough. The leather had ripped open, and so had the top of my foot. I could have laughed – I hadn’t felt a thing. Sometimes having debris crush your feet in years past was useful. Maybe I should have thanked Granta Omega for dropping that building on me.

I studied the screw – it was fat, and the thread was thick, but it still came to a point. What I was about to do would hurt like a bastard, and that was just for the start of it. I thought about the creature in the life-support suit that had once been my friend. “You have Anakin,” I said, ripping the sleeve of my tunic up and out of the way. It went easily, as damaged by the Force Storm as my body had been. “You may even have me.” _But I’ll be damned if you’re ever going to touch those children._

Tearing into my flesh with the screw did indeed hurt, but not nearly as much as it might have if my body had been undamaged. And it was slow going – trying to part flesh and vein from wrist to elbow with anything other than a sharp blade was difficult. When blood finally began to flow in strong currents, I dropped the screw and slumped back against the wall.

Bail, Mon Mothma, Leia, Luke, Owen, Beru, Yoda, Ki-le El, Antilles, Bel Iblis, Gayana Tiers, the Wookiees who were quietly arming the Alliance directly under the Empire’s nose… the list was long. Too long. I knew almost everything about the underground, because I had helped set up most of it. There were too many lives and futures at stake.

I wasn’t even the first martyr for the Rebellion. I certainly wouldn’t be the last.

 _Force forgive me._ I already felt light-headed, and the amount of blood leaving my body was quickly pooling on the floor beneath me. If my clothing hadn't been black, the blood soaking into the cloth would have stood out in stark contrast.

 _I’m sorry, Anakin,_ I thought, slumping further as my vision began to gray out, laying my head down on the cold cement floor. It was soothing to my skin, as so little in this place had been. _I wish I could have helped you. I hope someday that someone can._

Then there was darkness, and it was kind.

 

*          *          *          *

 

.... _You wanted to know what happened,_ Anakin whispered, his voice coming as if from far away. _This is it._  ......

Vader thought that there was nothing left in him of his old life, of his old self. He believed that the fire had burnt every last trace of Jedi from him, and over the intervening years he had worked hard at ridding himself of all vestiges of Anakin Skywalker.

Seeing his former Master lying on the damp stone floor of his cell, pale and lifeless, blood from the long gash in his arm pooling around him, told him how wrong he was.

“Master!” he cried without realizing it, the word deep, harsh, and metallic. For the first time, he took no notice of his new voice, dropping to his knees beside Obi-Wan. Black leather-clad hands gripped Obi-Wan’s shoulders, staunching the flow of blood with but a thought of direction in the Force. Mustafar had forced him to learn the Sith ways of healing, and that knowledge served him well in this moment.

Darth Vader, dubbed Lord of the Sith by the Emperor himself, cradled Obi-Wan’s limp form in his arms and probed in terror for any last remains of his Master’s consciousness. For all that Obi-Wan had galled him these past weeks, enraged him with his stubborn loyalty to the light, Vader had never thought that his old teacher, his brother-in-arms, would seek death. In spite of once trying his best to kill him, Vader had never really thought of what the world would be like without Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Anakin had. The spark that had once been a loving little boy with no real hatred in his heart for anyone cried out at the injustice at it. The part of himself that he had thought dead sang out in grief.

He caught a hint of awareness in the body he cradled and snatched at it, keeping it from crossing into death with the same intensity in which he had once tried to destroy it. “I’m sorry, Master,” he whispered, the words too soft to be translated and amplified by the equipment that made Darth Vader’s deep, threatening voice. “But you’re not getting out that easy.”

Obi-Wan fought him, which surprised Vader, and he almost lost the man to death’s grey embrace. Vader reached out to take a firmer grip on that spark of life and got caught in Obi-Wan’s thoughts instead.

_—Too close too close too close they’re too close he’s too close to finding all and I can’t let that happen can’t let him find the children—_

Children. Inside the mask, Vader closed his eyes. His beloved wife had lived just long enough to bear the children from her womb, and Anakin had not even known they were to be twins.

In that instant, he made his decision.

“You are going to live,” he whispered. “You are going to do what you promised my wife – you are going to look after my children. Keep them from this dark place. Keep them…” he sighed. “Keep them away from me.”

It was Anakin who spoke, who hid in the dichotomy of Vader’s thoughts. He withdrew the second lightsaber from his belt, tucking it into the black tunics, hiding it from view. Anakin fought Vader with tooth and claw and fierce denial, flagging down one of Palpatine’s weak-minded minions, placing a neatly shrouded Force suggestion in his mind. The bewildered Hand would take Obi-Wan from this place and leave him in a hidden spot near the abandoned Temple. In the last conscious act he would perform for the next decade, Anakin Skywalker buried Darth Vader’s memory of everything he had found in Obi-Wan’s mind, and what he had done to ensure his former Master’s escape.

With a sigh of effort, Anakin disappeared back into the jumble of Darth Vader's mind, too exhausted to fight back against the darkness any longer.

 

*          *          *          *

           

There was blinding sunlight. I blinked up at it, not sure why I was doing so, especially when it hurt. I took a step and staggered drunkenly, managing to fall down on my ass instead of my face. Talking was beyond me. In fact, I wasn’t quite sure I remembered _how_ to speak. A hand dropped down in front of my face, and I swatted at it, trying to get it out of my way.

“Oh for fuck’s sake. Here.” Suddenly I was hauled up by strong arms, and held against a warm body. I felt like an icicle, so the warmth was nice. Very nice. I snuggled against it.

“Obi-Wan. Come on, Obi-Wan, you’ve got to help me out here. You’ve got to walk. One foot in front of the other. Come on, that’s it.”

I was walking, but I still had no idea who was helping me, or where we were going. In fact, I wasn’t sure where I was. Or why my arm hurt like blazes. “Where…?”

“Damn, he’s out of it. Do you think he's been drugged?” a familiar voice asked. In fact, the other voice was familiar, too, now that I gave it some thought.

“There are worse things than drugs,” the first voice told the second. “Whatever this is, it’s bad.”

“No kidding. Even when he got plastered with me the night before my wedding, he could still swing a lightsaber with the best of them.”

Plastered at a wedding? That was actually helpful. It had only happened once. “Bail?”

“Oh, gods.” A careworn face appeared in front of mine. Definitely Bail’s. There were purple crescents of exhaustion under his eyes, lines of worry framing his mouth and eyes. “Obi-Wan, are you okay?”

"No?” I replied, hesitant. I certainly didn’t feel okay. “You look bad.”

Bail snorted. “You don’t look so hot yourself, ace. Come on. Master Windu, let me help you –”

That got my attention. I turned my head, and found myself staring directly into Mace Windu's eyes, which were sporting their typical annoyed glare. “I’m being carted around by a dead man,” I managed to say with perfect clarity.

Mace snorted, the corner of his mouth pulling up in a wry smile. “Yeah, but I think right now it’s an argument about which one of us qualifies more.”

“But…you’re dead,” I repeated, still staring at Mace. It seemed very important that I make this clear. “So that means I probably am, too.”

Mace sighed. “No, but I think you might wish you were.”

I blinked at that. “Oh.” Anything else seemed beyond me. Without further protest, I let Mace and Bail, full-blown hallucinations if there ever were ones, haul me… well, wherever they planned to take me. That turned out to be a ship. They helped me stumble up the ramp, while I considered that this had to be one of the best hallucinations, ever. It even came with a comfortable bed. I looked around once more, just long enough to notice that both of Mace’s arms, from elbow to wrist, seemed to be cobbled droid parts, and lost consciousness as the ship’s engines began a warm-up cycle.

 

*          *          *          *

 

I was sitting up in bed, watching the room spin with a sort of bemused attachment, when I felt Mace enter the room. I looked up, still feeling a bit astonished to see him alive. “Hi.”

“Hi.” Mace turned a chair around and sat in it, resting his hands on the back of it. “You look like shit.”

“Thanks,” I muttered. It was probably a compliment. I hadn't been out of bed, hadn't looked in a mirror, but I had seen the stunned looks that Abella and Bail gave me when they thought I wasn't looking. “We’re… on a different ship?” I hazarded a guess. It felt like the _Tantive IV_ , but… Gods, I wasn’t sure about anything.

Mace nodded. “You’ve been out of it for a few days. Abella is doing the best she can, trying to put you back together, but it’s not been easy.”

I sighed. Abella. I hadn't even known she was still alive, but she was here. She was as deft with the Force as she ever was, and it was under her care that I'd started feeling like a living being again.

“How are you feeling?” Mace asked, his tone neutral, but I couldn't help but notice the lightsaber displayed prominently on his belt.

I scowled at him. “I'm not going to go running down the halls of the ship, causing mayhem and ripping people's heads off, if that's what you mean.”

He grinned, and some part of me relaxed, because really, I sort of expected Mace to slice into me and have done with it. Strange how interstellar war and genocide could mellow some people. “That's good to hear. How are the shields holding?”

I gave myself a none-too-gentle mental poke. The new shields Mace had helped me to erect between bouts of unconsciousness, meant to help shore up my damaged mental walls, were holding steady. “They're doing the job.” I sighed again, dropping Mace's gaze, not sure I could handle those piercing brown eyes right now. Part of it was because Mace was, as always, a strong light that seemed to see straight into the core of you.

The other part of it was my body telling me in no uncertain terms that Mace Windu was looking like the world's best edible treat. That was one thought I certainly didn’t need right then.

“Good. Because there are too few of us as it is, and I'm not in the mood to kill any more friends.” He glared at me, as if to make sure I was paying attention. “If you do start feeling the need to cause mayhem, be sure to let us know, huh?”

I looked at the bandages that covered my left arm, and felt... adrift. As if I still wasn't quite connected to my own body. “I tried to do something about that once already.”

Mace grinned. “We noticed. Abella says it looks like you tried to do yourself in with a shoe.”

I glared at him. “You try doing something like that with a dull, rusty bolt, and see how _you_ fare.” Then I noticed the tell-tale brightness in his eyes, and was nearly undone. “Don't, Mace. I don't think there is much of me left worth crying over.”

He frowned at me. “You let me be the judge of that, Obi-Wan. Though we're curious to find out how you got away from the Emperor.”

Emperor. _He's won for now_ , I thought. _We're all calling that man by his self-proclaimed title_. I glanced at the bandages again, and my stomach lurched with unnamed anxiety. “I don't know,” I whispered. “The last thing I remember before you found me is... well, this,” I said, running my finger down the length of my forearm. The healing damage I knew to be underneath throbbed in sympathy. Thanks to the medication I was on, it didn't hurt much, but my vision kept wobbling. Bacta would have been nice, but that would have to wait. Bacta had become rare again, since the Empire was hoarding it all. “For all I know, I'm a plant and the Emperor can hear every word we're saying.”

“You don't have any kind of implants. We checked while you were unconscious. I trust you, and I believe you when you say that you don't remember.”

I stared at him. “I wouldn't. Why in all the hells would you believe me, when I can't even talk to you about—about—” my words stalled as my throat seized, and I had to count to ten before I could relax and breathe again. The first time Bail and Mace had asked me about what I had been doing while in Palpatine's company, I had a panic attack that had ended with me being sedated.

He watched me as one watches a fragile object that is in danger of breaking. I wanted to reassure him by telling him that I was already broken, thank you very much, so he didn't need to mince words with me. Or maybe he did. I knew that they hadn't updated me on the status of the Alliance, and I couldn't blame them. “You're a horrible liar, and you've always been a horrible liar,” Mace said, unconcerned. “Even when you were a Padawan, with the biggest crush on your Master that I've ever seen—” he stopped speaking. Something of what I felt must have shown on my face, because he apologized. “I'm sorry, Obi-Wan. I know it wasn't a crush. I know that you...”

“Still miss him?”

Mace sighed, letting me redirect that line of thought. “Yeah. Me, too.” He hesitated. “I thought you might want to know. Mon Mothma escaped Coruscant, thanks to you. She told me what happened.”

I fought back another fierce spike of panic, breathing through it. “I didn’t betray her,” I whispered. It was all I could think of to say.

Mace nodded. “We know. She asked me to thank you, if I ever saw you again. She—” His commlink beeped for attention before he could continue. As he moved his hand to answer it, the entire ship rocked, and I heard the sound of distant explosions that were immediately replaced by sirens shrieking out an alert. “Dammit, what now?!” Mace groused, standing and heading for the door.

The ship rocked again, and he caught his balance with the grace of the Jedi Master he still was before pointing at me. “Stay,” he ordered, before disappearing out the door.

“Like hell I will,” I grumbled, standing and going after him. I needed to know what was going on. I needed to know that everyone was safe. I could feel Leia's presence on the ship, shining like a beacon, and it was still my job to protect her. I just wasn't sure who was going to look after me.

Bail saw me and glared at me before strapping a blaster to his thigh. The bridge was full of moving, tight-lipped people who were preparing for battle. “We're being boarded. I still don't know how the hell they knocked us out of light speed.”

“Interdictor,” I said, not bothering to ask for a weapon. I wouldn't have been able to use one, and really, I just didn't trust myself with one. I'd end up killing the wrong person. Probably myself.

“What?” That was Abella, grabbing a blaster rifle that someone handed her and passing it along before accepting one for herself. It was strange to see her without a lightsaber, and at my questioning look, she grimaced. “Lost my lightsaber on Malastare, and replacement parts aren't exactly easy to come by.”

“No,” I agreed. Abella had been the Jedi hiding on Malastare, then. I was glad to see that she'd escaped Vader. “And the Interdictor is a design the Empire has been working on for months. It's a much newer, more efficient version of the gravity well traps that the Trade Federation used to use. An entire ship creates a gravity field that is literally the size of a planet. It fools all ships within range into dropping out of hyperspace so that they don't run into the planet the nav computer thinks it sees.” That one had been Anakin's—Vader's— idea. Brilliant design. Terrifying concept in action.

“Son of a bitch,” Mace swore, not even bothering to say anything about my blatant disregard of his order. “That's not good.”

“No, it's not,” Bail said, stroking his beard. He looked scruffier than I'd ever seen him, and the signs of exhaustion he exhibited made my heart ache for him. “It means hyperspace is no longer the safe haven we're used to it being. Kat a’tel rysch!” he swore, his eyes flashing in anger. He turned to the dark-haired man at his side. “Captain Antilles, have you identified our visitors yet?”

“Negative, Viceroy,” the Captain shook his head, looking grim. “But they sure took out our engines. We're not going anywhere, and help won't arrive for at least six hours.”

“We're on our own, then.” Bail stuffed another power pack into the pocket of his well-tailored breeches. “Let's go greet our friends.”

I followed them at a safe distance, though with the ship breached, safe was a relative term. I followed Mace, Bail, and Abella through an open bulkhead and then stopped. Something was... something was wrong. I turned and walked unsteadily down the corridor, making it halfway to the next bulkhead before I heard a whispered curse as Abella ran with silent grace to catch up with me. “Where are you going?” she demanded, the blaster rifle pointed in my direction.

“Something's wrong,” I hissed back. “I think the first breach is a distraction.”

“Then what is it?” Bella asked, now walking with me, the rifle pointed in front of us. “What are our new friends up to?”

I quickened my pace. The sense of impending disaster was getting stronger. “The Emperor knows that Anakin had a child,” I said, guessing that if she was serving with Bail, he would have told her of Leia's importance.

Bella said something in Chitanook that I didn't have a chance in hell of interpreting, though I understood the feeling behind it. “How did he find out?”

“I don't know. He didn't get it from me—at least I'm fairly certain he didn't,” I said, shaking off a horrible feeling of guilt. “But he doesn't know if it's a girl or a boy, or that there is more than one. I'd like to keep it that way.”

“So you think he's going after Senator Amidala's allies, to see where her kid might be?”

“It's what I would do,” I replied, coming to a sudden halt as my prescience roared to life. I pushed Bella back towards the bulkhead doors, barely making it through the archway myself as the walls exploded inward behind us. The doors slammed shut, and I lost part of my borrowed robe to the mechanism. I shed the garment, now clothed in only the loose pants and shirt of a med-ward escapee, and shivered against the chill in the air as the ship's systems tried to compensate for the lost atmosphere. “We've got to find a way around, fast.” I could feel Leia's presence somewhere ahead, and knew that someone in the group now entering the ship via the new breach could track her, too.

“This way,” Bella said, turning to run. I followed her as best I could, and wound up bruising myself in new places as I bashed into walls that I couldn't quite focus on in an effort to keep up. We weren't going to get there fast enough. “Don't wait for me,” I called out to her. “Run!”

She nodded and turned into a brown, furry blur as she used the Force to enhance her speed, disappearing down the long corridor. I followed, clenching my teeth against the chill, feeling a warm tingle collect at my fingertips. That tingle was better than the constant pain I was in.

I hoped Bella would stop them. If I got there first.... I shuddered, even as the tingle at my fingertips got warmer. Palpatine had taught me well.

I had almost caught up when I heard a shrill shriek of pain. The shriek was followed by the unmistakable sensation of a Jedi passing in the Force.

I stumbled, knowing that it was Abella. My friend, the most peaceful being I had ever known. A Healer who had been forced to put aside her talents and pick up a lightsaber to fight in a war she hated.

The pain went away. My breath was coming in sharp gasps, but I didn't notice. All I could think about was Abella. I had known her our entire lives, and now she was gone.

I rounded a corner, and came face to face with someone I recognized. A Hand of Sidious. He was directing a stormtrooper to use a fusion torch to cut through a vent—Leia, with a small child's wisdom, had hidden in the ventilation shafts where she could not be followed. I saw Bella lying in a crumpled heap against the corridor wall, blood pooling around her body.

The Hand noticed me and turned to face me, a grin twisting his scarred face. He looked me up and down, yellow eyes glinting with dark humor. “You look unwell, Venge.”

“Don't call me that,” I snapped, my vision narrowed to a sharp focus on the Hand's face. I took a step forward. The other troopers raised their rifles, looking to the Hand for permission to fire.

“No further, Venge,” the Hand said, waving the stormtroopers back. “We might both work for the same man, but this is my prize that I'm taking to him.”

My vision, blurry and bouncy, became clear all at once. “My. Name. Is. Not. Venge.” I ground out at him, balling my hands into fists.

He waved his the blaster pistol at me. “Whatever,” he said, green eyes paling to yellow as he called the Force to bear. He grinned at me, showing off rotten teeth. “Maybe I'll get a promotion for killing you, too, Lord Venge. You can join your little friend there.”

That did it. The rein I had kept on myself since Bail and Mace had retrieved me from Coruscant fell apart. The tingle in my hands burned like fire. I felt like I was chewing on electricity as raw power flooded my body. Maybe it was visible, because the stormtroopers suddenly raised their blaster rifles and fired at me. I ignored the blasts. They were panicked shots, and went wide, though one scored a slight mark on my arm. I didn't care. I waved my hand, and the Hand's escorts were flung down the corridor, crashing with horrible snapping sounds against sealed bulkhead doors.

The Hand had stopped smiling, which made me happy. Any more of that grin and I would have lost what sanity I had left. He pulled his lightsaber from his belt, igniting a dark red blade. “I will destroy you, pet of Lord Sidious or not!” he screamed.

I laughed at him. “Do you know how to overload the power cell of a lightsaber?”

He hesitated, just for a moment. Plenty of time for me to act. “What?”

Finding the power cell inside the casing of his lightsaber was easy. Overloading it with the Force was easier, and I was stunned by the raw power I was channeling. The Hand's lightsaber emitted a high-pitched whine before the cell reached critical mass, too fast for him to realize what had happened. It blew up, taking his hands, part of his arms, and his dubious good looks with him. Bits of superheated shrapnel rained down around me as I walked up to the Hand, who lay on the floor, moaning in pain. I didn't know what I was going to do, but something stopped me before I could kill the Hand. A sound was penetrating the red haze of rage that had swallowed me upon Abella's death.

I looked around, noticed the abandoned cutting torch, and saw the jagged hole punctured in the ventilation shaft. The noise I was hearing was a child's frightened crying.

In that moment Palpatine was there, in my mind. I screamed in revulsion, my hands clutching my head as I doubled over. A bond that I hadn't known existed, hidden from sight and sense, flared to life.

 _Good!_ Sidious was saying, an oily chuckle accompanying his words. _I could feel your anger across the galaxy. You are worthy of being my apprentice, after all!_

“No,” I whispered, backing up against the wall, trying to escape from the presence in my mind.

Another laugh, and I slid down the wall, still clutching my head. _The Dark side of the Force has granted you more power than you have ever known, my lovely Jedi. My lovely Venge. You will bring me the child of Skywalker, and you and your former apprentice will both kneel at my feet._         

 _You will not have Anakin's child. You will not have me._ I didn't need power. I didn't care about my own life. All that mattered in that moment was the promise I made to a dying woman. With the sound of Palpatine's mocking laughter echoing in my mind, I went deep inside myself, searching. Within me I had always held a core of light, what I saw as my own connection to the Force. It was warmth and life, and Leia's salvation.

 _You cannot stop me,_ Palpatine snarled, and I could feel dark bands of power sliding down that horrible bond, reaching for me. _You will do as I say, or you will die!_

“Yes,” I said out loud, and smiled. “I will.” I wrapped mental hands around my own inner light. Without giving myself time to think about what I was doing, I ripped it out.

There was immediate agony that went beyond anything that had ever happened to me. Torture, pain, fear, wormholes—nothing compared to this. My blood roared in my ears, and my heart beat so hard and fast I thought that it would burst from my chest. I writhed on the cold metal floor, not even capable of screaming out my pain. I thought I heard a shriek of rage. Then my strength was gone, and I collapsed. I could move no further.

I barely felt myself draw breath. Warmth was gone, but I didn't feel cold. I felt... nothing.

My connection to the Force was gone.

Palpatine was gone, too. Where there had been the beginnings of madness and darkness was only silence. I closed my eyes in relief. He would never be able to touch my mind that way again.

I heard a harsh scramble of noise as others arrived. Too late for me, too late for Abella—but they could be there for Leia. Maybe Mace could take my watch on Tatooine.

Metal hands that felt like firebrands, even through my shirt, gripped my shoulders. I opened my eyes again, fighting to see. Mace. Shouting at me. I felt myself smile. Some things never changed.

“Dammit, Obi-Wan!” he yelled, and I realized he was crying, his expression stricken. “What the hell have you done!?”

“Saved her,” I whispered, inordinately pleased with myself for having an answer even Master Windu couldn't refute the worth of. Then my eyes drifted closed of their own accord. Despite the silence that was ringing in my head, I felt more at peace now than I had in years. No wonder the ancient Jedi Masters welcomed death.

“Hey! Don't you dare go anywhere, you son of a bitch!” I heard Mace roar, but it sounded distant, unimportant. “Stay with me! Dammit! You hear me?! You stay with me!”

I drifted further down into darkness, and couldn't hear him anymore.

Strangely enough, I didn't die.

 

*          *          *          *

 

I woke up sometime later to the feel of a warm touch at my temple, and my head felt like it was pillowed on something. Something familiar. “Master,” I breathed out the word, unable to manage anything else. I was drifting, not certain of where I was. The silence in my mind made my own thoughts echo, and each echo created a pattern of chaos that I had no hope of undoing. I simply existed within it, and let it wash over me.

Yoda's hand touched my face again, and I felt it tremble. “Foolish Padawan,” the ancient Master whispered. “A horrible thing you have done.”

I wondered which thing in particular he had in mind, but decided it probably didn't matter. I didn't even know where I was. I didn't know what day it was, what time it was. Yoda's appearance just added to my sense of dislocation.

“Are you sure we should do this?” Mace's voice. It seemed like far too much effort to open my eyes, so I didn't. “We might be able to repair the damage, and that's doubtful. Even if we do, what guarantee do we have that he won't Fall?”

I wanted to laugh in disbelief. I had already Fallen—did Mace want a signed affidavit to prove it?

Yoda brushed gentle hands through my hair, and though the touch set fire to frayed nerve endings, I didn't want him to stop. It was far more comfort than I deserved, and I clung to it. “Strong he is, Master Windu. But broken, even the strongest of us can be. Time to heal, he needs.”

I heard Mace sigh, his voice frustrated. “We don't have that kind of time, Master Yoda. I think we should let him go.”

Yoda's tone became sharp. “Think you so, do you? Give up so easily, would you? Knowledge, Obi-Wan found. Not ready was he, but fought he did, and Fall, he would not. Honor what he fought for, we should.”

“I...” I heard the sound of pacing footsteps. “All right. But Yoda, I... I have no idea how to do this. If you hadn't told me it was possible… hell, if I hadn't felt him _do_ what he'd done, I would have said that was impossible, too.”

“With the Force, possible all things are,” Yoda said solemnly. “The Force is our ally, and a powerful ally it is. Life creates it,” he said, and touched my forehead with the tip of a claw.

I gasped, tears flooding my eyes, as I felt a whisper of the Force in the back of my mind. The silence that I had found so comforting was now abhorrent, and I fought to find more of that connection.

“Makes it grow,” Yoda was saying, and I thought I could hear him humming under his breath. “Feel it, do you?”

“Yes,” I whispered, amazed to find that I could.

He patted my shoulder. “Wish to do something for you, I do,” he said. “Much pain you have found. Much you have suffered. Trust me you will, hmm?”

I didn't hesitate. “Yes.”

Yoda directed his next words to Mace. “Help me, will you?” Yoda asked. “Difficult, this will be. No easy thing this is.”

There was another touch of the Force from Yoda, and I fell into a dark, dreamless sleep before I heard an answer.

           

*          *          *          *

 

Alderaan's air always had a particular scent to it, a hint of wild that I knew well. I opened my eyes, stared around at an unfamiliar room, and wondered why the hell I was on a planet that, last I knew, I had been far away from.

I sniffed again, and this time over the scent of Alderaan, I smelled bacta. I sat up, scratched at my skin, and discovered that I was the source of the bacta. Scales of dried gunk peeled off of my arms like old skin. I must have been sleeping in old bacta crud for days.

I was in the midst of peeling off a particularly long strip of dead bacta when the door opened, and Breha Organa peered into my room. “You're awake!” she said, a wide smile breaking out on her face.

“That's debatable,” I replied, surprised to find my voice hoarse. “Where...” I trailed off, not even sure what I was going to say.

“You're in the royal palace, on Alderaan,” Breha said, stepping closer. There were dark circles under her eyes, and she seemed paler than usual. That worried me, but I wasn't sure why. “You've been here for two weeks.”

My jaw dropped. “Two _weeks?”_ That was an abominably long time to be in for medical treatment in the age of bacta.

She nodded, taking a rust-colored robe down from a peg on the wall, bringing it over to me. “Your injuries were grave, my friend. Massive calcification of your skeletal structure, multiple old fractures that needed repair—the list is longer, but I don't have the stomach for it.” She handed me the robe, which I put on, enjoying the soft weight of it over the thin shirt I was wearing.

“I...” I trailed off, trying to think. I couldn't remember being injured. I tried to recall something—anything—and received a massive headache for my efforts. I winced, putting my hands to my head. My skull began pounding in time with my heartbeat, and neither seemed all that pleased with me.

Breha gave me a sympathetic look. “You should speak to Master Yoda about that. He said that you would likely have headaches when you awoke.”

“Yoda is here?” I asked, feeling like I was missing something important. Yoda should have been on Dagobah.

“I'm sorry that I can't tell you anything more, Obi-Wan. I'm going to tell Bail that his guest is awake. You may wish to visit the 'fresher in the meantime,” she said, ducking out of the room after giving me another smile.

“I...er...yes,” I said, speaking too late to catch her. The 'fresher sounded like a good idea.

I was cautious about putting my feet on the floor, but when nothing untoward happened, I stood up. The room swam. I closed my eyes, wobbling on my feet, but didn't fall. Eventually I felt better, and the room came back to proper focus. I didn't seem to be in pain, except for the headache, but I was weak, weaker than I could ever remember being. Crossing the room left me out of breath. I wobbled my way into a small 'fresher. Using it was forgotten, however, the moment I caught sight of my reflection in the mirror.

My mouth opened, but I could think of nothing to say. I could barely comprehend what I was seeing.

The last time I'd seen a mirror, my hair had been military short, the gray at the temples blending into the golden color my hair had faded to over the years. I might have been here on Alderaan for two weeks, but I knew that I'd spent a much greater amount of time somewhere else. My hair had grown out past my ears, but that didn't disturb me as much as the swaths of stark white that shot through the blond. Nor was that as disturbing as the harsh lines around my eyes, or the deep grooves around my mouth and on my forehead. I had lost weight I could never afford to lose in the first place, and it showed. There was a haunted gleam to my eyes, despite the expression of shock I wore. Hell, even my beard was streaked white.

“You're old before your time.” Bail.

I turned around to find my friend standing in the door of the 'fresher, wearing the robes of his rank in the House of Organa. He was also wearing a disgusted look. “The next time you decide to run off and try to kill a Sith Lord, Obi-Wan, do yourself a favor: Don't.”

I couldn't even begin to fathom what he was talking about. “What?”

He closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose with his hand. “Gods. What the fuck am I going to do with you?”

“What?” That seemed to be the only word I could manage to say.

His dark eyes were glittering with unshed tears when he moved his hand away. “Never mind. It's not important. Now would you sit down before you fall down?”

I managed two steps and sat on the toilet hard enough for my teeth to clash together. If the lid hadn't been down, I would have been soaked. “Yes, Viceroy,” I said, hoping for a smile.

“Dammit, dammit, dammit,” Bail muttered, strode forward and wrapped me in a tight embrace. “I could grow to fucking hate Jedi, you know that?”

I let myself be held, baffled.

What the hell was going on?

 

*          *          *          *

 

Bail excused himself, saying that he had to get back to a committee meeting but he would return. I nodded, still rather dazed, and tried to figure out how to put myself back together. There was a shower in the 'fresher. I turned on the water as hot as I could stand it, sat down on a built-in ledge, and let water pour over me for what seemed like hours. Bless Alderaanians and their firm belief in massive amounts of hot water. I found a soap that didn't smell like it was made of perfume and scrubbed bacta off of me. My body looked like I'd turned into a malnourished, bald Gundark.

I dried off, found a brush, and decided immediately after trying to pull it through my hair that my days of long hair were over. Using the brush was far too much effort. I shuffled my way around the entire room, looking for scissors. No scissors. I was going to have to convince someone to chop off my hair.

My lightsaber wasn't in the room, either. Neither were any clothes other than more loose-fitting medical garb. The heat of the shower wore off quickly, and I was wrapping myself in the heavy robe again when Bail and Breha returned together. A 21B medical droid followed them into the room, and without preamble it performed a holographic scan of my body. “Hey!” I protested, though it was a futile effort. 21B models were nothing if not efficient, the bastards.

“It is good to see you up and about, sir,” it said in a surprisingly pleasant voice. “However, your body will need rest for quite some time.”

“I'm gathering that,” I grumbled, and saw Bail smile. He was clasping one of Breha's slender hands in his own, and I was struck once again by how well they suited each other, by how much their love had grown in the years since I had seen them both together. The 21B finished rattling off the same list of ailments that Breha had already mentioned to me. When it became apparent that I wasn't going to say anything, it continued speaking. “We have healed most of the damage, sir, but that won't last.”

That got my attention. “What do you mean?”

The droid made a noise almost like a sigh. “Your body has been stretched to the end of its endurance, though I'm not certain as to the cause. Within a short time, the pain medication in your system will wear off, and you will find yourself in chronic pain for the rest of your life. The massive electrical field damage you were exposed to was left untreated for too long, and there was nothing I could do. Your heart has also been put under immense strain. You will find that, without replacement, you will probably not live past your seventieth decade.”

“Oh.” For whatever reason, the thought wasn't as shocking as it could have been. “I doubt I'll even live that long.”

The droid dipped its head in acknowledgment of that statement. “Of course, sir. We live in dangerous times. Now, I must ask you about a pain regimen—”

“No,” I said, cutting the droid off. “No drugs. I'll deal with it.”

The droid gave another one of those almost-sighs. “As you wish, sir. I would like you to stay here tonight, and if you seem well, I'll arrange for your release in the morning.”

“I can walk, and I can shower. Let me out of here now,” I said, in what I thought was a perfectly reasonable tone. The Organas gave me near-identical stern glares.

Not even the droid was having it. “I'm sorry, Master Kenobi, but I must insist. It is only for observational purposes, I assure you. The more we view the workings of your body while conscious, the more information we may be able to give you about your health.”         

I sighed. I couldn't argue with that. “All right. As long as someone brings me food and access to the HoloNet, I'll be an agreeable patient and stay here.”

“Of course, sir,” the droid said, inclining its head and moving away. “I will return shortly.”

“We have to leave you now,” Bail said, standing up before helping Breha to her feet. I noticed the pinched look to her face and worried. Breha's health had suffered during the war, but this was worse than I remembered. “Leia will be awakening soon, and we have a new child in our home as well.”

“Adopting again?” I asked, glad for the momentary distraction of good news.

“Yes,” Breha said, her smile tinged with sadness. “Though not one we planned. A dear friend of ours died with his wife in a crash, leaving their daughter, Winter, without family. She and Leia were already friends. They will be happy together.”

“I'm... sorry for your loss,” I said, shaking my head. I'd seen the war make many children orphans, either by losing their parents, their Masters, or both. The words still sounded inadequate, no matter how many times I had to say them.

“It's all right, Obi-Wan.” Bail gripped my hand, and I squeezed back, grateful for the touch. “Master Yoda will be back this evening. He discovered there was a Jedi nearby, and went to see him, give him a better chance of avoiding the Empire.”

I stared at him, and Bail paused, realization breaking out on his face. “Oh—

Force. I'm sorry, Obi-Wan. You wouldn't have remembered. You were... a bit messed up.” He waved to Breha. “Go ahead, love. I'll catch up with you. I think I need to give our friend a briefing.”

Breha nodded and ghosted out of the room, and Bail, with much hesitation, told me of the attack on the _Tantive IV._

*          *          *          *

 

The next morning I could walk without a hint of wobbling, and I escaped from those damned med-droids and made my way out into one of the palace's gardens. Breha was a goddess with plants, and the gardens had thrived since she had taken up residence here full time. I found a bench and slumped into it, wiggling my bare feet in cool, wet grass. Just being able to touch the earth made me feel better.

I couldn't meditate, I'd discovered, but at least I could enjoy the soft dawn light, the sounds of birds awakening in hidden spots in the trees. It was soothing, whereas being trapped in the med-center had been maddening. I'd read the news reports, but I still couldn't get over the fact that I was missing three months of my life.

I didn't feel him enter the garden, but I wasn't surprised when Master Yoda hobbled up next to me. I got my first clear look at him since I had awoken on Alderaan, and my heart ached at the sight. Always the elder, Yoda had aged much in the past two years. It showed in the tired cast to his face, in the hunch of his shoulders, and the shuffle in his walk. I said nothing, though, as I knew he was still just as capable of swatting me with that stick as ever. I held out a hand, and Yoda used my help to clamber up onto the bench, sitting next to me and emitting a sigh of contentment. “It's good to see you, Master,” I said.

He nodded, giving me a warm smile. “Good it is to see you, Obi-Wan. Better you are feeling?”

I thought about it. “I'm still breathing, therefore I must be all right.”

Yoda huffed out a breath. “Better, you definitely are,” he said, an annoyed tone to his voice, but that was belied by the humor I could see in his eyes.

We sat together as the sun finished rising, turning the flowers in the garden from soft grays to vibrant blues, shades of purple, and the contrast of pure white here and there. Bail's wife had always been into color coordination. I was content to wait and enjoy the quiet, before the palace came alive for the day. I knew that Yoda had something to say, but I'd learned long ago not to rush him.

“Leave tomorrow we must, Obi-Wan,” he said, and I nodded. Staying on Alderaan too long would be like waving a giant flag in the Empire's face. If we didn't leave soon, our very presence in the Force would attract someone. Bail had told me that it had already happened before. Thank the Force that Bail had been able to say with perfect honesty that he hadn't known that Voshee was here. Part of me ached for the death of yet another Jedi, but the rest of me was grateful that Leia's haven was still safe.

“I'll miss this place,” I said, breathing out a sigh of my own. Alderaan was a planet I loved like no other, despite the number of worlds I'd been to, and my time here was always far too short.

“Mmm,” Yoda said, nodding his agreement. “Strong in the Force, this place is. Full of life. A light against the darkness, Alderaan will be.”

Something tickled my awareness then, though I didn't know what it was. I reached for it and lost the sensation, along with most of my awareness of the Force. The bright morning light suddenly felt dim. My control hadn't been this abominable since I was a young Initiate, years away from my apprenticeship. I sighed, disgusted with myself.

Yoda looked at me then, as if sensing my difficulty. “Come with me you should,” he said.

“I should go back to Tatooine, Master,” I said, though I was in no rush to do so. The thought of being alone... frightened me. I didn't even have the comfort of understanding why that was so.

Yoda nodded, unconcerned. “To Tatooine you will eventually go. To Dagobah, we shall go. Recovering, you still are. Hide us both, I can, until better you become. A gift of a ship, the Viceroy has made you.”

Leave it to Bail to give me a ship. I knew that he'd make sure the registry was untraceable. “Then I guess I'm going to Dagobah, Master.”

“Mmm. Questions you have. Wait for Master Windu, we will. Soon he will be here.”

I shook my head, still amazed by that bit of news. Palpatine had announced Mace Windu dead when the Purges began.

Some time after the sun had risen high enough for it to shine over the tall garden walls, a cloaked figure stole into the clearing Yoda and I sat in. He came forward and sat down on the bench next to me, letting out a deep sigh. “You still look like shit,” Mace announced, tossing the hood of his cloak back.

“Thank you so very much,” I smiled back. He looked at least a decade older than when I'd last seen him, but given what was going on in the galaxy, that wasn't all that strange. We were all being worn down by what was happening. Some of us more so than others. “If Bail hadn't warned me, I would have sworn you were a hallucination. You seem quite lively for a dead man.”

“Being a ghost has some definite advantages of late.” He put his arm around my shoulders and pulled me close for a moment before leaving the bench, sitting down cross-legged on the ground in front of us. I was bemused and touched by his gesture. Mace Windu had never been the demonstrative type. “It's good to see you alive. Until a few weeks ago, I didn’t know that you and Yoda had survived. I've only run into a few of us, and usually they've been making their way into the Outer Rim territories as fast as a transport can make the trip.” He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Quinlan is still alive. I saw him for just a moment, but it was definitely him. He's going underground. I doubt we'll see him again, but at least it means he'll live.”

I was glad to hear that. Quinlan Vos had fought his own demons all through the war, and he deserved a chance at peace—or as much of a chance as there was of that, now. “Anyone else?”

Yoda nodded. “Even Piell. Here, he was. Sent him on to Corellia yesterday, I did, where others have been hiding. Preparing to make a hidden colony, they are.”

“Geith, Callista Ming, and Pleth are on Belsavis keeping an eye on that system while keeping their heads down. Rumors are that Palpatine has a pet project hidden there,” Mace said, his brow furrowed with worry. “I saw Crèche Master Jil-Hyra with some of the children on Coruscant. She said she'd gotten them out through the lower levels of the Temple. Thracia's alive, too. I've spoken with her. Since she wasn't actively part of the Order during the war, she's managed to avoid the Empire's notice.”

We kept speaking, listing names and sightings, even rumors of sightings. Yoda had a few, as several Jedi had stopped on Dagobah long enough to hide from pursuing Imperials. It seemed like every other Jedi we tried to add to our list we had to remove because their death had been witnessed, sensed, or reported for criminal activity and execution.

After we were done, I closed my eyes and slumped down on the bench, not sure if I felt relief or sadness. Approximately one hundred and fifty Jedi remained, if some of the rumors were to be believed. Even though the number was much larger than my original count, it still didn't leave me much reason to cheer. There might even be more than that, but one way or another, one percent of our total number remained. The sightings themselves were starting to dwindle, as the surviving Jedi went underground, hiding from the Emperor’s vengeful gaze. _Stay hidden,_ I thought. _Stay safe._

I found myself looking at Mace's arms again, thinking to myself that it looked like the elder Master had stolen a droid's limbs to use as replacements. He noticed where my attention had gone and grimaced. “I suppose you're curious as to how that happened.”

“A little,” I admitted, and noticed Yoda's ears perk up. I guessed that even he had not heard this story yet. “What happened?”

Mace hesitated, then told us of how Anakin had come to him, borderline hysterical, because Palpatine had just told my former Padawan that he was the Sith Lord the Jedi had been searching for over the last thirteen years. Making sure Anakin stayed put, not wanting his friendship with the Chancellor to become a conflict of interest, Mace took the last members of the Council still on Coruscant and went straight to the Chancellor's office. “I was a damned fool,” Mace said bluntly. “Four Jedi against a Sith Lord of unknown ability? I might as well have killed Saesee, Kit, and Agen Kolar myself.”

“Blame yourself, you should _not,_ ” Yoda said, his voice fierce as he stared hard at Mace. “Knew Sidious's abilities, you did not. Tried to stop him, you did. Tried to stop him, I did, and alone I was. Almost died, I did. Call me a fool, you also should.”

Mace shook his head, giving Yoda a sad smile. “No, you old troll. I get your point. I did what I thought was best at the time.” Both of them glanced at me. I could only stare back and wonder what the hell _that_ little look was for.

“Regardless of my instruction, your stubborn ex-Padawan came anyway. I hate to say that I...I’d lost it. I'd just watched Palpatine kill three Jedi Masters, my friends, without even a hint of effort. Palpatine was trying to blast me with lightning, and I'd gone from trying to arrest him to trying to kill him. Anakin tried to stop me.”

Mace was staring at the ground, his shoulders rigid, jaw clenched, and I knew how much it was costing him to admit what had happened. “He yelled at me, said I was just supposed to arrest Palpatine. Force help me, he was right, but I was so angry I couldn't back down. Anakin stopped me just the way we taught him,” he said, holding up his right arm.  "Disarm without killing--and then Palpatine blasted me out of the damned window. I landed in a speeder about twenty levels down. Scared the hell out of the driver, but he saved my life, got me underground and away from the attack on the Temple. I damaged my left arm so badly in the fall that they had to amputate.  He helped to get me a pair of replacements that would function, even if they're not the nicest things. After that, when I could walk again, I started working to get the surviving Jedi off of Coruscant.

"Obi-Wan, you should know.” Mace looked up at me, concerned. “When Anakin stopped me from killing Palpatine, I felt no darkness in him in that moment. A lot of confusion, fear over what was happening, and worry. Definitely panic. But darkness? Enough for him to do what he did next? No. The man I last saw in that room was not the same one who invaded the Temple with the 501st that night.”

I sighed. I had long felt much the same way. “Palpatine. I have no other explanation for it than that. I don't know what changed. I only know that on Mustafar, Anakin screamed something about a betrayal. And then, after it was over, I realized...” I trailed off, thinking. During the flight to Polis Massa, Padmé had told me that Anakin firmly believed that to reveal their relationship would be to end Padmé's political career, and to see Anakin cast from the Jedi. I'd been bewildered by that at the time. Anakin had been taught that our lives were our own after Knighting. In light of everything else, I could only surmise that Palpatine had been able to convince him otherwise.

“You realized what?” Mace asked, giving me one of his typical pointed looks.

“I suppose it doesn't matter now. Any Jedi that paid even a bit of attention knew that Anakin and Senator Amidala shared a Lifebond. They were married at the start of the war. It wasn't exactly to Code,” I said with a wry smile. “But as Anakin never again let his relationship interfere with his duty to the Jedi, I was willing to ignore it. We were at war, after all.”

Mace and Yoda nodded their understanding, no hint of the old censures visible. Maybe in a time of peace it would have been a big deal for Anakin to break the rule that disallowed Padawans any sort of attachments, but during the war? He sure as hell wasn't the only one. We were all trying our best to hold on to the Light. “After we fought, I discovered that their bond was broken. I thought Anakin did it, but now?” I shook my head. “Now I wonder.”

Yoda fiddled with his gimer stick, his eyes half-lidded. “Perhaps Anakin did not do so. Perhaps Palpatine did this, though how he could do so, I know not. But know this, I do: attack her so willingly, Anakin should not have.”

I stared out across the garden, my heart heavy. “I never should have left him there. I shouldn't have let him die like that.”

“Dead, Anakin is,” Yoda said, his voice quiet, angry. “Sidious's new apprentice is he. Darth Vader lives.”

Ah. Force. I covered my mouth with one hand, running my fingers through my beard, and realized I had no anger, no grief, no tears. I didn't even feel much surprise at learning of Darth Vader's continued existence. I supposed there was only so much you could take before your ability to be shocked by horror went away. “What do we do, then?” I asked, resigned. Sidious had done his work well.

“We wait,” Mace said, grim. “We watch. We listen. We learn. Sidious is almost untouchable right now, secure in his position as Emperor. Vader will not be swayed, and is more dangerous than he ever was after what the Emperor did to put him back together.”

“The children of Skywalker are the key,” Yoda said. “Defeat Vader they can. Defeat the Emperor, they will.”

Mace looked incredulous. “Yoda, they're toddlers.”

“They won't always be children,” I said, and though the strategist in me understood and marveled at Yoda's patience, the rest of me quailed at the thought of using Anakin's own children against him. _No,_ I told myself sternly. _Yoda is right. Anakin is dead. Only Darth Vader remains. Anakin's children will restore the balance that Palpatine destroyed._

That felt right to me. That felt just. In a galaxy where justice had skipped out on lunch and declined to pay the bill, there was little recourse for us than time, patience, and faith.

Of course, that pleasant line of thought, for whatever reason, made my head pound again. I rubbed my throbbing temple and wondered if I was being daft for turning down the medical droid's offer of pain medication. In light of that thought, I had but one question to ask. “What the hell happened to me?”

They glanced at each other, communicating with the barest whisper of the Force and the slight movements of those who had worked together for a long, long time. “Gravely injured you were,” Yoda said at last, and I knew he was choosing his words with care. “Contacted me, the Viceroy did, to let me know that you and Master Windu were with him. Suggested that a visit might be in order, did he.” Yoda's ears twitched, as if amused by Bail's phrasing. “Arrived to find that I had missed an attack. Saved Leia, you did, but at great cost to yourself.” He sighed, and I was stunned to realize the ancient Master was crying. “Stubborn, you always were.”

Mace picked up where Yoda left off. “We saved your life, but it was not without sacrifice.”

“My missing time,” I guessed. “Will it come back?”

They looked at each other again, and Mace shrugged. “When the three of us are together once more, we will have this discussion again. You need time to heal.”

I nodded, though I knew otherwise, and they would know that I was sensible enough to come to my own conclusions. If the memories didn't come back on their own, they weren't coming back at all. The chances of the three of us being together again like this were almost nonexistent.

Yoda climbed down from the bench, pulling up his own hood. “Off to see the younglings, I am. Miss them, I do,” he said, his voice soft.

“Master,” Mace said, reaching out to just brush Yoda's hand with his own metallic one. The normally stoic Jedi Master's eyes were filled with emotion, but there was a smile on his face.

“Never my Padawan you were,” Yoda said, regret clear in his voice. “But wish it could have been so, I do. Farewell, my friend.” With that the ancient Master turned and walked away, not looking back.

I turned a stricken expression back to Mace. There had been more finality in that moment than just a departure. “Mace Windu, what the hell are you up to?”

“Hush.” He smiled at me, taking out his lightsaber. “Someone has to make sure that as little attention is paid to our kind as possible, and I elected me. If I keep the Imperials busy, you and Yoda and all of the others will have a better chance of surviving.”

“Committing suicide is not the brightest way to do that!” I yelled.

“Are you arguing with me, Obi-Wan?” Mace asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Hell yes!” I retorted, glaring at him.

He gave me a wolfish grin. “Good. You're going to be one hell of a Jedi Master, Obi-Wan Kenobi. Now let me see to it that you live long enough to do so.”

Whatever it was that I was about to say, I stopped. Mace said nothing lightly. “I wish you didn't have to,” I said at last, defeated.

“Believe me, so do I,” Mace said, taking his lightsaber out from where it was hidden under his robe [Edit: He already did that!]. “I have a gift for you, and then I have to go. A transport is waiting to get me as far away from the two of you as I can get.”

“A gift?” I asked, watching him stand up. He assumed a position that was familiar, the blade not yet ignited, and I had to laugh. “A lesson? _Now?”_

“Hey, you asked to learn the _vapaad_ ,” he said, and for a moment the years fell away, and it was like the Empire had yet to be born. Just one moment, and it was gone. “There is one kata left. I'm going to demonstrate it, and when you're physically capable, I expect you to practice it until you can do it in your sleep.”

I swallowed hard, knowing Mace was giving me my farewell. “Of course I will. I'll think of you and curse your name, every time.”

He nodded, his smile pleased. “You'd better. If you aren't swearing, you're not doing it right.” Then he launched into the final kata of the _vapaad,_ the Seventh Form, and I watched the entire thing, cataloging every detail. When he was done, I knew it by heart.

Mace nodded [repetition] at me, pulled the hood of his cloak up to hide his face, and left the garden. I knew I would never see him again.

 

*          *          *          *

 

I'm not sure how long I sat there, contemplating little more than insects buzzing around flowers and a pervading sense of loneliness, before I found myself sandwiched between Bail and Breha.

I smiled. “Hello again. Took the rest of the day off, did we?”

Bail draped his arm across my shoulders. He'd ditched his robes of office in favor of a pair of simple black pants and a blue shirt. “There is some benefit to being Viceroy, after all,” he said.

Breha had curled up against me, much closer than I ever remember her being. “Our friends are important to us. Government affairs can and will wait another day.”

I wasn't so exhausted that I couldn't guess what they were up to. “I feel as if I'm in the center of some nefarious plot.”

“Not yet you're not. We usually feed our victims first,” Breha said, before using my shoulder as a pillow. “You could use about a dozen meals, but we'll start with just one.”

“How does lunch sound?” Bail asked.

I thought about it and realized that food—real food—sounded fantastic. Then I thought about how far it was to even a private dining hall and considered whimpering. I was most assuredly in horrible shape. “Does it require moving?”

Breha laughed. “No. In fact, eating out here sounds like a great idea. The girls can join us, if I can pry them away from their aunts, who are trying their best to spoil them rotten.”

Bail gripped my hand and then stood up. “Don't worry, my love. I will brave my sisters, rescue our girls, and return with nourishment.” He strode from the garden, and Breha's smile disappeared as she began coughing into her hands. Once again I noticed the dark circles under her eyes as she sat up, coughing harder.

“Breha, what's wrong?” I asked, the concern I felt obvious in my voice.

She glanced at me out of the corner of her eye. “I should have known that you would notice. Thank you for not asking in front of Bail.”

I stared hard at her. I had known Breha Antilles-Organa almost as long as I had known her husband. We had never spent any great length of time together, but I knew, even without the Force, that something wasn't right. “Tell me.”

She had drawn a delicate handkerchief from a pocket while we spoke, coughing into it again before holding it out and looking at it in disgust. The dark red blotches stood out in stark contrast against the white cloth. She folded it up, put it away, and looked at me with sad dark eyes. “During the worst of the war, I was helping refugees escape from the front lines. Normally, I wouldn't have gotten away with such a thing, since we had produced no heirs. Being that I proved to be unable to bear children, however, it wasn't such a great concern. One of the Confederacy's attacks on the camp involved the spread of a toxic gas. I'm told it was a variant on the swamp gas that decimated Omah-Dun. One of the soldiers with us gave me his mask, so that I could breathe, but even trace amounts of the toxin were destructive.” She shrugged. “I am told that I am fighting off the gas's effects quite well, but I can't hold out forever.”

“Bacta?” I asked, hopeful. Alderaan was officially part of the Empire, and therefore wasn’t suffering the bacta shortages that were happening in the Outer Rim territories. A bacta mist treatment for the lungs had proven to be a near-miracle treatment for so many things.

She shook her head. “It helps, but only for a while. I start hemorrhaging again within a few days of each treatment. We had thought that with the end of the war, we could approach the Kaminoans and broach the possibility of growing transplant organs. Not just for me, mind, but for everyone.”

I closed my eyes at that. It was an excellent idea, one I had heard from the Jedi Healers as well. The Kaminoans, however, had closed up shop, disappearing into the galaxy much as they had before I'd found them. Their cloning technology had disappeared with them. “I'm sorry.”

“I know.” She took my hand, entwining her pale, slender fingers with my scarred, callused ones. “You know, if things were different, I would ask you to stay. Bail is going to notice soon, and it breaks my heart to orphan my girls yet again.” Her eyes were bright with tears, but none fell. “I wish you could be here for them.”

I swallowed hard. “So do I.”

She smiled. “I will tell him soon enough. But not today. Today we will be grateful for what we have been given. There is time enough tomorrow for all that may yet be.”

I wrapped my arm around Breha's too-thin shoulders and held her close. Force, was it ever going to be enough? Palpatine was responsible for more death, destruction, and heartbreak than this galaxy had ever deserved. One more time, I was going to wind up saying goodbye to those I loved, and I knew that she would be long gone before I ever had a chance to return.

Bail returned before long with a droid bearing a tray, and every single smell that emanated from it made my mouth water. “Don't drool,” Bail instructed me. “And you two! You're going to sit and eat, and then you can run around the garden like insane little monsters!”

Two girls of identical height peeked out from behind their adoptive father. I guessed the other to be Winter, and her lost parents couldn't have chosen a more apt name for their daughter. Pale blue eyes, white hair, pale skin. She and Leia might as well have been polar opposites. However, they bore the same mischievous smile, both of them nodding at Bail's instruction. Leia bounced up to me, Winter trailing behind, uncertain. “Hi,” Leia said, looking up at me with dark, dreamy eyes. “You were on the ship with my Daddy.”

“So I've been told,” I said, staring down at a girl who very well could have been her mother's clone. “My name is... Ben,” I said, hesitating for a moment before giving the name I'd already decided to use on Tatooine.

“Hi, Ben.” Leia tilted her head, studying me with intense regard. _She is just two, right?_ I found myself wondering, calculating her age. There was a depth of awareness in her gaze that seemed out of place. Then again, she and her brother were heirs to a massive gift. Yoda had put blocks in place to keep their Force abilities from attracting too much notice, but I imagined their strength was going to manifest in interesting ways as they grew. “Are you a bad man, Ben?”

That was a question I hadn't expected. “I don't think so, little one.”

She smiled, and suddenly she was a toddler again. “Okay. This is Winter,” she said, taking her friend's hand as Winter stepped up next to her. “She's my friend.”

“It's very nice to meet you both,” I said, swallowing against the hard lump in my throat. Here I was, introducing myself to a child who had taken her first breath, first sight, cradled in my arms, and I felt like I was going to fall apart.

Breha understood. She squeezed my hand, then stood, already herding her adopted girls. “Come on, you two. Let's go help your father unburden that poor droid of lunch.”

Eating helped, and after a short while I felt more settled than I had been since I'd read three months' worth of events that I had no memory of. The children ate like birds, getting up and running around before sprawling in the grass, then returning to their food to pick at it before running away again. Their energy was inspiring, and I pulled myself together enough to run two circles around the garden with them before I collapsed next to Bail and Breha, winded but laughing. The girls sat down together on my stomach, pretending I was a downed Nerf that needed to be doctored.

Bail grinned at me. “Well, they're right about the doctoring part, but you taste much better than Nerf.”

“Hey!” I said, swatting at him. “Not in front of your children.”

“Relax, they're two,” Bail was saying, and Breha shook her head, rolling her eyes.

Leia was paying more attention than Bail gave her credit for. I yelped in surprise when she bent down and licked my bare arm. She sat back up, a confused look on her face. “Daddy, he doesn't taste anything like Nerf!”

Breha giggled, and I stifled a laugh at the blush that colored Bail's cheeks.

That evening I was back in my room in the medical wing, examining a pile of clothing on my bed. I lifted the raw silk, staring at the tunics someone had provided for me. When I sensed Bail enter the room, I spoke without turning. “These are brand new,” I said.

“Most of your things have either been lost or destroyed,” he said, his voice quiet. “What I found I placed on Avery's ship. It's yours now.” I nodded, not surprised that it was the former smuggler's ship that Bail had gifted me. “But I do have this.”

I turned around to find Bail holding out my lightsaber. Some part of me that had been quietly panicking for over twenty-seven hours relaxed. “Thank the Force,” I said, reaching out to take the weapon from him. “I was afraid to ask if it had been lost. The thought of rebuilding it is rather daunting right now.”

“Understandable,” he said, stuffing his hands in his pockets, looking uncomfortable. “Master Windu found it when he stumbled over you, and asked me to hold onto it. He said I would know when the time was right to return it.”

I held my lightsaber in my right hand, touched by a strong sense of unease that I could not place. Deciding to dwell on it later, I placed my lightsaber on top of the new clothing, turning back to my friend. He looked more lost than I had ever seen him, and I had the feeling it had to do with me. “I'm not going off to die, Bail. I'll return, eventually.”

To my surprise, he shook his head. His dark eyes, always so expressive, were filled with grief and finality. “No. Not this time. I don't need the Force to tell me what I know in my heart. When you leave tomorrow, I'm never going to see you again.”

I wasn't sure what to say to that. My control was so shoddy that there was no touching the threads of possibility to see if his words were true—and honestly, I didn't want to know if they were. “Bail...”

He cut me off, holding up one hand. “Wait. I...” He ran his hand through his hair, half-smiling. “Damn, but this is hard. I want to tell you something.” He took a deep breath and looked at me, and there were things in his eyes that we had known of for years, though we never spoke of it. “I know that your heart has always belonged to another, and that it always will. I have always been grateful for the part of yourself you have allowed me to have. I know that you love me, though not in the way that I once dreamed of having. If things had been different, I would have pestered you into taking up residence on Alderaan long ago.” He smiled. “I know, at the very least, that it would have been interesting. Before you go venturing out into the universe one last time, Obi-Wan Kenobi... I wanted you to know how much you are loved.”

“I—” I broke off, my heart somewhere in the vicinity of my throat. I had no words. To know of his feelings had been one thing. To hear him speak of those feelings, to hear him tell me exactly how much I meant to him... never in my life had I experienced that. I had never expected to, either. “I have no idea what to say,” I whispered.

“Say, 'I love you too, Bail,’” he instructed, smiling at me.

“I love you too, Bail,” I replied, and realized I was crying. Again. My eyes had gone daft. I couldn't seem to stop crying, anymore. “Come here and hold me before I fall down?”

“Yes,” he said, and he took two great strides and engulfed me in a strong embrace. “Come stay with us tonight?” he spoke, his chin resting on my shoulder.

“But...Breha?” That was one thing we had never done, to spend time with each other when she was nearby. I had never wanted to risk damaging their relationship. “'Us?’”

“Funny story, really. She suggested it.” He stepped back, and there was a hint of pleading in his eyes as he looked at me. “Say yes. Let me have this night with the two people I love most in the universe?”

I smiled. As far as last requests went, this was one that I would happily grant. “Yes.”

We gathered up my few things, escaping into the quiet halls of the royal palace. A lifetime ago I had been here at the age of seventeen, meeting Bail Organa, Heir Apparent—and then I'd saved his life, both of us covered in mud and giggling like ninnies. A few years later I had brought Anakin here, and in the middle of the night Bail and I met in one of the gardens and had messy, wonderful sex. No complications, no Ascension, no Separatists, no war.

As if sensing my thoughts, Bail's hand made its way into mine as we walked. “You know, you were my first,” he said, looking sidelong at me.

I grinned. “And I had no idea until it was over. Do you remember how flabbergasted I was?”

“'Oh no, I've deflowered the Viceroy's son!'“ Bail mocked my long-ago self, laughing. “Oh, yes, I remember that panicked look. I might as well have told you I'd taped the entire encounter.”

“You'd better not have,” I muttered, and he grinned and winked.

Bail led me to quarters far different than the ones I had seen years ago. This was a full suite, as opposed to the small bedroom Bail had once dwelled in alone. Through a main room I saw doors that led into an open, empty office. Across the way were two closed doors, and I knew without even asking that the rooms belonged to Leia and Winter.

We walked into the bedroom he shared with his wife, and I was struck by an immense sense of tranquility. Soft carpet under my bare feet, deep grays and pale blues on the walls, in the drapes, upon the bed. I was surprised to find that the muted tones created a sense of peace within me. For a moment I had an intense longing for just such a sanctuary.

Breha emerged from what was probably a 'fresher, dressed in a thin gown, a smile on her face. “For a moment, I feared you would say no.”

“I would be daft to have said that,” I said, looking back and forth at them. “I'm not... sure what I'm getting into, to be honest.” Hell, at that moment I wasn't even sure I had the energy for anything more than collapsing onto their bed.

“Then you will simply have to relax, and for once, just once, let someone else lead, General,” Bail said, and though there was a touch of bitter mourning in his eyes, he was smiling.

Breha stepped forward, tugging on the sleeves of my robe, and I let it slide off my shoulders. Bail, moving to stand behind me, took it from me and tossed it into the corner. “Don't think,” Breha said, her hands ghosting across my shoulders to settle on my chest. “Just live. Just breathe. Just _be_.”

Just be. So much easier said than done, even with two pairs of hands drifting over my shirt, down my back...

Then Bail's lips touched the back of my neck, just once, and it _was_ easier. His touch had always eased me, every time, before we settled in and drove each other to the brink of madness.

My eyes drifted closed of their own accord, and before I knew it my shirt was going away. I opened my eyes when I felt Breha's fingers tracing the scar that ran down my chest, her eyes sad. “You do so much for us,” she whispered, leaning forward and breathing against my skin. The whisper of my sensation was gentle and teasing, and more than enough to catch my body's attention, exhausted or not.

“We can do so little for you in return,” Bail said, his lips just beside my ear. Then he leaned in closer and bit down on my earlobe, and I whimpered. The man knew how to use his teeth, and I was always appreciative.

“You are _not_ little,” I said, enough presence of mind left to offer a good-natured retort.

“No, he isn't,” Breha agreed, a knowing grin on her face. Then her hand cupped my groin, the feel of warm skin so easily felt through thin cloth. I made a strangled noise, not able to remember the last time I had felt _anyone's_ touch there.

“Not so long ago as that,” Bail said, as if reading my thoughts, and he pressed up against me, and I felt hard flesh against my ass, and slim fingers that were just as talented as Bail's were wasting no time in slipping into the front of my pants.

“One would think...” I managed to speak, “that the two of you had been planning this for some time.”

Bail's soft laughter against my neck, as he licked a line of hot warmth across my skin. “Perhaps we have.”

Breha had knelt in front of me, her dark hair cascading down her back as she grabbed the waistband of those abominable medical-issue pants and yanked them down. “You two talk too blasted much,” she muttered, then ran her hands back up the inside of my legs, nails just raking skin, and I hissed and leaned further back into Bail's warmth.

“I'll shut up when I'm no longer the only one naked,” I muttered, though really I stopped caring right about the moment that I felt Bail's fingers trace my spine. My breath caught, anticipation warring with immense impatience, as his fingers continued down, tracing the center of my hips, dipping into the cleft of my ass, seeking...

I stopped breathing for a moment, that whisper of sensation bringing my cock to full attention, and I felt Bail chuckle because the bastard knew how much I enjoyed this. “Just breathe,” he whispered, and his hand and warmth drew away, and that left me swearing at the lack. Then I heard the shuffle of clothing, and when that warmth returned it was skin pressing to glorious _skin_. I sighed, and that sigh turned to a gasp when my cock was engulfed in wet, tight heat.

That finger returned, moist now, and sought out my entrance and teased me, just on the verge of plunging in, and my knees began to tremble in earnest at the dual attack. Breha's clever tongue was teasing the underside of my cock, then the head, and she raked her nails down the inside of my thigh again and I made a strangled noise that was less language and more a plea.

Bail had pity on me and gently thrust one lubed finger inside me, and my head fell back to rest on his shoulder. He let his finger drift up, then down, almost out, a teasing damned spiral of sensation that kept fading and increasing. His other hand gripped my hip, pulling me back against him.   Then he added another finger, reaching up and just touching that sparking spot, right when the wonderful suction on my cock increased. My tired, overloaded body, sitting at its limit, couldn't take it anymore. So intense I didn't think I could bear it, not sure to push forward or back, I felt release welling up, my breath coming in sharp gasps. Then, as if they'd timed it, Bail and Breha increased the speed of their assault on my senses. I yelled out something incoherent, my vision whiting out as my knees gave way.

I was lying on something soft when I managed to find myself again. Bail was there, lying next to me on the bed, naked and looking smug. “That's a new one. You normally don't swear in Bocce when you come.”

“I speak Bocce?” I asked, managing an innocent look, and then I felt his wife swat my shoulder.

Breha lay down on top of me, draping herself across my side. Her long hair tickled my shoulder and back. “You also pass out. I'd feel guilty, but you look so very sated.”

She was right; I felt sated, pleased, more than a little energized—and predatory. “Now you’ve done it,” I murmured. “I hope you two hadn’t planned on sleeping tonight.”

Bail grinned at me. “I can sleep when I’m dead,” he said, using a statement that I had uttered many times during the war. I liked hearing the words much better in this context than the other one.

Breha tilted her head, smiling. “As long as I get my turn with at least one of you, I have no complaints.” She paused, and her smile turned naughty. “Hell, as long as I get to _watch_ the two of you, I have no complaints.”

At my questioning look, Bail half-shrugged, repositioning himself to kiss me. I closed my eyes, savoring his warmth, the feel of his tongue teasing my lips for a second. “I did mention that she likes men,” he said when the kiss broke, and I laughed and pulled him closer.

 

*          *          *          *

 

It was abominably early when I met Yoda at the open ramp of Avery's ship. I took a moment to peer at the fresh black lettering that graced the ship's hull. “ _Destiny_ , huh?” I shook my head at the new name the ship had been graced with. “Someone has a horrible sense of humor.”

“Hmm.” Master Yoda was giving me a sidelong look that I recognized from my days as a Padawan. “Rest well last night, did you?” he asked.

I grinned. Some things never changed, and for that, I was grateful. “Not a bit, Master Yoda.”

He smiled and preceded me up the ship's ramp, ready to depart. “Good, that is.”

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [In appreciation](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6684670) by [SomebodyElse (GB_Heron)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GB_Heron/pseuds/SomebodyElse)




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